The Third Life of Steve Rogers
by ForceForGood
Summary: After the final defeat of Thanos, Steve Rogers returns to the past to raise a family with Peggy Carter. He may not be an Avenger anymore, but his life's work is far from over. This story fills in the blanks left by "Avengers: Endgame." 1998-2001: Steve and Peggy agree to take in one of their grandchildren, Clint Barton's namesake, as his life spins out of control.
1. Chapter 1

_This story contains "Avengers: Endgame" spoilers._

**Title:** The Third Life of Steve Rogers

**Rating:** K (no violence, sex or language)

**Description: **After the final defeat of Thanos, Steve Rogers is resigned to living out the rest of his life in the present, until he makes a startling discovery that opens up new possibilities for his future. This story fills in the blanks left by "Avengers: Endgame." POV Steve Rogers, pairing Steve/Peggy.

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**Chapter 1**

Steve Rogers held the slender quantum reflector in both hands and, with great care, slid the delicate component into its housing unit. He glanced up at Bruce Banner, squinting against the sunlight that came filtering through the trees surrounding the clearing.

"How's that?" he asked.

"Not connected," Bruce said, scrutinizing the monitor. "Give it a jiggle. Okay, there it goes. Next one." The big green scientist lumbered over to the work bench to get another part.

The new Quantum Tunnel was nearly complete. Steve had spent the day helping Bruce put the final touches on it. He still marveled over the peaceful stillness of the Stark lake house property, with the chirping of birds and the lapping of waves and the occasional rush of the wind whistling through the trees. It was a welcome change from the din and fire and blood of the battleground surrounding Headquarters in upstate New York. Steve could still see it sometimes when he closed his eyes, but the horror was beginning to fade.

At the edge of their work area, an innocuous-looking case rested on the ground, containing all six Infinity Stones - which Steve had secured by the simple provision of laying Mjolnir on the lid.

"One more," Bruce said, handing Steve the final component and pointing a thick green finger at the slot where it belonged. Steve slid it carefully down until it clicked in place, and then looked at Bruce for confirmation. The scientist squinted through his glasses at the readout on his monitor, and then nodded in satisfaction.

"We're all set," he said. "We'll hook up a fresh bank of arc reactors once the Pym Particles arrive, and then we'll be ready to go." Bruce yawned and stretched luxuriously, his knuckles brushing the branches of the trees overhead. "I'm beat," he said. He lowered himself to the ground beside the platform with a reverberating thud and stretched out his full length, which was considerable. "I'm gonna close my eyes for a while," he mumbled, and then did just that.

"You did good work," Steve said, and Bruce waved a sleepy hand in response. He had been working on the new Quantum Tunnel night and day since the moment Tony's funeral had ended. He had been forced to start over from scratch, since they had not been able to recover anything from the rubble of Headquarters. Bruce's break was well-deserved.

Steve sat down on a fallen log nearby, resting his elbows on his knees, and looked over the glittering span of quantum reflectors suspended above the platform. It was hard not to focus on how much smaller this quantum tunnel was compared to the first one they had built. After all, there were not so many of them as before - Steve felt his heart constrict painfully, thinking of Tony and Nat - and during their long discussions over the last several days, the Avengers had agreed that returning the stones would be more straightforward than taking them had been. They would not need so large a team this time. In fact, no one had put up much of an argument when Steve had volunteered to take on the task himself.

Clint had already returned home to be with his family. No one had begrudged him, knowing how his family's absence had torn him apart him in the five intervening years... and he had been trying to retire to family life since well before the Snap, anyway. T'Challa, too, had returned to Wakanda. He had an enormous job ahead of him, as his people had never managed to fully rebuild their war-torn lands with half their workers missing. Bucky had gone with him. Peter Parker had returned to Queens with his aunt, Scott was in San Fransisco with his daughter, and Stephen Strange had returned to his duties on Bleeker Street. This morning Thor had left Earth with the Guardians of the Galaxy.

"Everyone is going home," Steve thought. "And here I still am."

How many times had he longed to go home? He thought of those first few months he had spent in 2011, lost, confused, lonely, and angry - yes, angry - that everything he had known - every_one_ he had known - had been taken from him in a freak accident. He had always been ready and willing to die for his country. He'd prepared for it. Countless good men had made that sacrifice, and he knew he had no right to give any less. But Steve had never dreamed that instead he was fated to _live._ To live on, in a country so changed in some ways it was practically foreign. A place where he didn't belong, a place he didn't choose. A man out of time.

Bruce mumbled something and rolled heavily over onto his side, one large hand curling protectively around the case containing the Stones. His muscles relaxed, his breathing deepened, and within a few minutes it seemed he was fully asleep.

Still, Steve made no move to go inside the house. He just sat there, feeling the breeze gradually dry his sweat-soaked T-shirt, and let his thoughts drift. How many times had he dreamed of going home to his own time? But it was impossible. Faced with no other choice, he had eventually made his peace with the fact that he was here to stay.

Except when he wasn't at peace.

His contentment in this time seemed to ebb and flow like the waves of the lake. Sometimes, when he was intent on his work, when he donned the uniform to fight alongside his friends, it was good. It was enough. He was even happy.

But at other times, there seemed to be an empty hole in his heart that threatened to consume him.

Everyone else was going home. Why couldn't he?

Abruptly Steve stood and strode away, leaving Bruce dozing in the sunshine in the clearing, and wove his way through the trees until he reached the edge of the lake. He stood at the end of the dock and gazed out across the lapping waves, where he could see the rowboat at the far end of the lake. Pepper and Happy had taken Morgan out on the water to keep her occupied. As if you could distract a child from the fact that her father was dead.

Steve lowered his head for a moment. Tony's absence here was like an open wound. Steve knew he had to stay here until the Stones were back in their proper times, but there were too many reminders of Tony here, and at times it was nearly unbearable. It wasn't just that Steve missed his quick wit and perpetual irreverence, endearing even when it was exasperating. It was the regret that hurt more than anything. They had butted heads so many times. Steve had always been certain he was in the right, but sometimes he wondered if he had handled things in a different way, found a better way to reach Tony, maybe their clashes wouldn't have gotten so personal.

He'd never know, now.

Steve felt his skin crawling, whether from the dust and the sweat of the long day's work on the device, or from his troubled thoughts, he wasn't sure. Impulsively, he sat down at the edge of the dock and took off his shoes and socks, followed by his pants. Clad in his shorts and T-shirt, he dived off the edge and into the water.

Autumn was coming and the water was almost too cool to be pleasant, but at least the physical sensation was a welcome distraction from his thoughts, and Steve swam out into deeper water with long, steady strokes. His muscles still ached from the battle, although the bruises were starting to fade.

He made a couple of trips, swimming back and forth between the dock and the center of the lake, when he heard a loud splash. He paused to tread water and saw that Wanda Maximoff was swimming toward him. So she had returned from wherever it was she had disappeared to this morning.

"Can I join you?" Wanda asked when she got close enough. She seemed strangely timid.

"Of course."

"You like to be alone," she observed, stopping to tread water.

"Not all the time."

Wanda was panting slightly from the exertion of her swim. "I hate being alone," she said. Water droplets dotted her face. Steve wasn't sure if it was just lake water, or tears. Wanda was miserable, and no wonder. For her, Vision's death was all too fresh.

"I know," Steve said gently.

Wanda said nothing further, but rolled over onto her back, and they floated side by side in the water in silence.

After a while, Steve could hear Wanda's breathing grow quick and shallow. At first he thought she was shivering in the cool water, but one glance told him that no, she was definitely crying this time.

Steve reached out to touch her shoulder. "Hey. Let's swim in."

Wanda nodded mutely, and together they swam back to the dock. Wanda heaved herself up onto the dock and sat there on the edge, legs tucked up against her chest and both arms wrapped around them, shoulders shaking with her sobs.

Steve sat beside her, and put his arm around her shoulders. "It's okay," he murmured. "You're okay."

"I don't know what to do," she choked out, and he knew she was truly distressed because her Sokovian accent was coming out strong again, as if she'd forgotten those years they had spent in hiding, trying to scrub themselves of all outer traces of their former selves. "Everyone's going away. Everyone is going, or gone, or _dead_, and I can't _stand_ how quiet it is in my mind..." She drew in a long, shaky breath, and he knew what she was referring to. The power of the mind stone she had shared with her twin brother - and later, with Vision - had bound her to them both in ways that went beyond emotion. Losing Pietro years ago had nearly unhinged her mind for a time, and now she had been dealt a double blow.

"Not everyone is leaving," Steve said quickly, although she was only articulating the exact thing he'd been thinking a short time ago.

"You're leaving too," she said. "You're taking the Stones-"

"Well, I'm coming back," he said firmly, but Wanda only shook her head frantically, water drops flying off the dark strands of her hair.

"You don't know that," she said. "You don't know what will happen. They've taken so many people, those _Stones_." She spat out the word like a vindictive. "All the fighting over them. Pietro... and Vision... and Natasha..." She bowed her head, and two big drops streamed down her cheeks.

"The worst is over now," Steve told her.

Wanda shook her head again, although her sobs quieted. "The worst was over when Thanos Snapped me," she said, her voice raw. "At least then I could rest. But now... now I have to live." She took a steadying breath. "And I don't know how to live. I don't know if I want to. I don't even know..." She sighed shakily. "I don't even know what to do with myself."

Steve thought for a long moment. "What would you have done if none of this had happened?" he asked slowly. "I don't just mean Thanos. I mean if you never volunteered for Strucker's experiments. If your parents had lived, if Sokovia hadn't been thrown into turmoil in the first place. What would you have done with your life?"

Wanda shook her head wearily. "I don't know."

"You could have done anything you wanted. You're smart, you're determined. You could have gone to college. You still could."

She laughed bitterly. "Yes, I can just see it. Me, going to classes. Making friends and doing my homework. Pretending to be a normal person."

"You could do it. You _are_ a normal person, Wanda."

"No, I'm not," she whispered.

Sighing, Steve gave her shoulders a squeeze. He couldn't blame her for feeling that way. He'd felt the same, when he first met Sam Wilson and he'd asked Steve much the same question. Steve hadn't been able to imagine himself doing anything but work for S.H.I.E.L.D. How can you go back to an ordinary life after so many extraordinary things have happened to you?

"You know, I used to think maybe Ultron was right about me," Steve said slowly. "That I couldn't live without a war. And then... I just spent the last five years not throwing any punches or slinging any shields. I was leading therapy groups, helping people heal. And do you know what? I was good at it. I was fulfilled." He turned to face her. "Dr. Erskine may have created Captain America, but he didn't create _me_, any more than Strucker created you. We were people before that, Wanda. And even soldiers are allowed to come home from war sometimes and live their lives like everyone else."

Wanda regarded him thoughtfully. "Did _you_ ever go to college?" she asked.

"In my first life. After I graduated from high school, I spent a year taking art classes from Auburndale," Steve answered. "And then the war broke out, and then Project Rebirth..." He shrugged his shoulders. "With everything that happened, I never got a chance to finish."

"Do you miss it?" she asked.

He hesitated. "I still do a little sketching sometimes, but mostly... I've just been too busy."

He rubbed Wanda's shoulder. "It's all right to think of yourself right now," he said. "Everything's quiet right now. Take some time and find out what you need to make yourself happy, and go after it."

"_You_ don't do that," Wanda said quietly. "You never think of yourself. The others, they told me. They said everyone fell apart after... after it happened, but not you. They said you took care of everyone else instead of yourself."

"Well, I've had more practice than them at losing everything and learning to live with it," Steve said.

Wanda looked at him a little too knowingly. "Tell me the truth," she said. "If you could do anything, what would you do?"

"Exactly what I'm doing," was what Steve wanted to say, but by long force of habit, he couldn't quite make himself tell a falsehood. How many more of his friends were going to tell him to go get a life? First Tony, then Nat, now Wanda. Didn't they realize that if he could, he would?

Wanda looked directly into his eyes with a sudden intensity.

"Show me," she said. "Show me what you really want."

Hesitantly, she lifted her hands and curled her fingers into graceful twin gestures on either side of Steve's head. He froze, not sure how to react. She had never attempted to touch his mind since the day she had attacked him at Ultron's behest.

"Please," Wanda whispered, wisps of red light flickering behind her eyes and leaking from her fingertips. "Please, everything is so quiet in my head. I don't want to be alone in there anymore. You don't talk about it, but I don't think you want to be alone, either." She took in a shaky breath. "I won't hurt you."

Slowly, he nodded. There was a flare of crimson light, and Steve blinked. Suddenly he was no longer sitting on the dock. He looked around to get his bearings.

There was no question where he was. He had been there only a few days before. Camp Lehigh, 1970.

Where he had seen _her_.

Hardly daring to breathe, he stood in the darkened office and gazed at that lighted window, knowing what he would see on the other side of it, torn between eagerness and reluctance. But in the end his compulsion won out. He took one step toward it, then another. His destination seemed to be miles away, but somehow, step by step, he reached it.

She came walking briskly into the room onto the other side of the glass, and Steve felt chills shoot down his entire body.

_Peggy..._

She was perfection.

He had dreamed of her so many times over the years, but somehow he had forgotten so much. The energetic way she walked, with a swish of skirt and click of heels. Her voice reached him faintly through the glass, crisp and animated. She came over quite close to the glass, shuffling through papers, talking to someone else. It didn't matter who. Peggy was all that mattered. Breathless, he gazed hungrily at her face: the keen intelligence shining through those almond-shaped eyes, the flash of a dimple, the expressiveness of her bright red lips... it all seemed to belong to him, though she never knew he was there. Standing there, looking through the window, in that moment, every single particle of his being longed to be with her. To just walk through that door and be back in her life. If Tony hadn't been waiting for him, if Pym's vials had not been weighing down his pocket, if he hadn't had a mission to accomplish... he would have done it. No looking back. No regrets.

The light faded away. The window faded away. Peggy faded away.

When Steve came back to himself, Wanda was looking at him with sudden understanding.

"It is the same woman," she said, low. "The same woman I saw before."

"Yes," Steve whispered.

"She is from the time before. Your time."

"Yes."

"If this is what you truly want," Wanda said slowly. "Then... you should go to her."

"No," Steve said hoarsely. "I can't."

"But you _can_," she insisted, and despite the tear stains on her cheeks, her eyes lit up with hope. "Steve, the Quantum Tunnel! You could _go_. No one would blame you. We have defeated Thanos. The world is at peace, your work is done. We would-" Her face twisted. "I would miss you terribly. But as soon as the Stones are returned, you could-"

"I _can't_," Steve said harshly.

"But-"

"You heard what Bruce said when we all met together," Steve said. "What Doctor Strange said. You can't change the past. It's too late, Wanda. It was too late 80 years ago. She married someone else. She had a _family_. She..." He set his jaw with determination. "I can't go back. All I can do is my best, and sometimes the best we can do is to start over. She learned to be happy without me, and I'll have to learn it, too."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

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**Author's note:** "Avengers: Endgame" was a fantastic capstone to a slew of movies filled with very fine writing. It gave a fitting ending to many of the Marvel characters we have come to know and love over the years. There were a number of un-seen scenes implied in the movie, particularly at the end, that I wanted to explore further, such as Cap's decision to return to the past, his farewell to Bucky and the others, and his reunion with Peggy.

There has been some debate among Marvel fans (and even between the directors and the writers!) about several issues, such as whether Cap started an alternate timeline when he went back to the past, as well as questions including "Was Steve Peggy's husband all along?" "Were there two Steves living in the world simultaneously?" "Why did he give the shield to Sam?" "How did the shield get to that bench?" This story is my answer on these questions, and is also my homage to all the professionals involved in Marvel Phase 1, who pulled off the nearly impossible task of tying up a sprawling franchise in a satisfying way. I hope you enjoy it! Please feel free to leave a review.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's note:** Thank you to Kallie49, Peacockgirl and silverstardust for your kind reviews!

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**Chapter 2**

When Wanda had left, Steve went back to the lake house and changed into dry clothes. Inside, it was quiet. Pepper, Happy and Morgan were still out on the boat. He wandered into the living room, not knowing what to do with himself. He got a book from the bookshelf, flipped through it without seeing the pages, and put it back.

Something was very wrong.

Ever since he could remember, Steve had always had an unshakable conviction of what was right and what was wrong. And he had always followed where that inner voice led him, even at great personal cost. Even when the task seemed impossible. This voice had never failed to lead him to the right path.

And now it was prompting him to destroy someone's life.

What if he did go back? He would have enough Pym Particles and to spare. Once the work was done, it would be as simple as typing in the new coordinates into his Quantum Suit. He could go back to before Peggy met her husband. She would never know any difference. Even her husband would never know any difference. He would probably go on to have a happy life anyway, whoever he was. It wouldn't change all that much, in the grand scheme of things.

Steve knew he was only justifying his desires, that what he was contemplating was dangerous, for more reasons than one - and yet, without making a conscious decision to do so, he crossed over to the shelf where the housing unit for his nanoparticle suit rested, and slid it over his hand. The screen lit up in response.

The coordinates were already programmed in, all five of them. Vormir, 2014. Morag, 2014. Asgard, 2013. New Jersey, 1970. New York City, 2012.

With furrowed brow, his fingers moving as if in a dream, he entered in a sixth coordinate, just to see how it felt.

New Jersey, 1945.

The numbers shone up at him, small and clear, mocking him.

_You can't change the past._

But Doctor Strange _had_. He had alluded to a major change he had once made in a timeline, reversing time to undo the destruction of the Hong Kong Sanctum. Somehow he had done it without creating any paradoxes or hideous alternate futures. If _he_ could do it...

Steve couldn't believe he was even thinking of this. He couldn't believe he was thinking of himself. He had always put others before himself, like Wanda said. That was the right thing to do. Never before had his inner voice told him to do the wrong thing, and it was hard not to feel betrayed that it was failing him now.

The compulsion to listen to it was nearly irresistible.

Quickly, he erased the last coordinate from the spacetime GPS. But it didn't make him feel any better. It would be all too easy to put it back in. With growing horror, Steve realized that as things currently stood, he could not trust himself to step onto the platform and enter the Quantum Tunnel again tomorrow. There was a very real chance he was not going to do the right thing.

_Peggy's husband was a real person,_ he told himself firmly. _He had a name, he had a life. You can't take that away from him._

But he wanted to. Words could not express how much he wanted to.

How could he stop himself? Steve's mind raced, trying to come up with something. He knew nothing about Peggy's husband. It was all too easy to betray a stranger. Maybe... maybe if he knew more, he wouldn't be able to bring himself to do it.

"Friday?" he said.

Tony's user interface responded promptly. "How can I help you, Captain Rogers?"

Steve opened his mouth to speak, and then closed it again. His heart pounded unnaturally loud in his ears. He had avoided this so carefully over the years. That time he had gone to visit Peggy as she lay in her bed, weak and old, he had seen the family photo on her dresser, and it hadn't been easy to hide from her the pain it brought him. It was a relief to him that he hadn't had to face her grown children in person. It was a nurse who had greeted him at the door. He'd been careful to speak to no one but Sharon at the funeral, and no one else there had approached him. Almost as if they had sensed his desperate need for privacy.

Still, the photo was seared into his memory. Two children, a boy and a girl, of similar ages, sitting together on a couch by Peggy. From the 1950s, he had guessed, by their clothing and their hairstyles. He wished he could forget their faces. He should be happy that Peggy had found happiness and built a family of her own. Instead he was hurt. In his worst moments, he was angry. And guilty. Yes, guilty.

He thought he had made a noble choice, crashing that plane into the ocean, but maybe he had really been selfish. It was Peggy who had paid the price, Peggy who had to stay behind and grieve. He thought of an interview she had once given, the one he had seen playing in the Captain America exhibit of the Smithsonian. The interviewer had asked her about the 97th Division, which had been trapped by a blizzard behind enemy lines in Stalingrad, and was ultimately rescued by Captain America in January 1945.

Peggy had spoken movingly of how she had later married one of the soldiers Steve had liberated there. "Even after he died, Steve was still changing my life," she said. The unshed tears in her eyes had felt like an accusation. He had wanted to be the one to change her life. But not like that.

Not like that.

"Captain Rogers?" Friday prompted him.

"I want..." Steve took a deep breath. "I want to know everything you have on Peggy Carter's husband."

"Accessing," Friday coolly responded. Multiple screens filled with names and dates began to pop up on the display table. "Peggy Carter's husband, Grant Edward Buchanan, was born on May 30, 1918 in Brooklyn, New York. He attended Lincoln High School there, graduating in 1936. His military service began in 1942, where he rose to the rank of first lieutenant, serving in the European theater and earning a Distinguished Service Medal for his service in Volgograd. He returned to America in 1945 at the conclusion of World War II, and married Peggy Carter in 1946 in Wheaton, New Jersey."

Steve flinched. So soon? Only a year after he had gone under the ice. He'd have thought... he'd have hoped... that Peggy would grieve for him for longer. Instantly he felt a pang of remorse at the thought. How could he wish her more pain instead of less?

Friday was still talking, summarizing Buchanan's life, but he cut her off, feeling an urgency to rip off the bandage all at once. "Let me see a picture of him."

Friday paused for a moment. "No photographs are available."

Steve raised his eyebrows. "What?"

"There are no photographs on record for Grant Edward Buchanan."

Steve frowned. "He must have military records, at least."

"There are documents pertaining to his service, but none with photographs."

Steve's frown deepened. "A driver's license? Passport?"

"Negative."

Steve thought for a long moment. "What about social media? Didn't he join MyPlace or something, once it came along?"

"You must be thinking of MySpace," Friday said, and there was a definite hint of amusement in her voice. Sometimes it was uncanny how much of Tony Stark's personality shone through his creations, and Steve felt a fresh stab of grief at the thought even as Friday added: "But there are no social media accounts in his name."

Steve stared out the window for a minute. "This can't be right. I've seen family photos..." Although, now that he thought about it, the other photos in Peggy's room he'd caught glimpses of... Had any of them actually had a man in them? For the first time, he wished he had taken a good look at them.

"I guess the guy was camera-shy," he said out loud. Some people cherished their privacy - Steve considered himself one of them - although in this day and age it seemed like everyone threw privacy considerations out the window with both hands. There were cameras everywhere, in businesses and on streets and in everyone's pocket. How had Peggy's husband managed to live a whole life in the technological age without being photographed?

Just then he had a strange thought. Could Buchanan have worked for S.H.I.E.L.D.? As a spy? Maybe that's how he had met Peggy. It would explain the secrecy. There could have been a team dedicated to scrubbing away any traces of him.

He was tempted to call Nick Fury and ask. But he knew if he brought Fury in on this, the director would start poking and prodding and sticking his nose in Steve's business. And calling Maria Hill would have the same result as calling Fury himself. If only Natasha were still here...

Steve sat down on a chair, buried his face in his hands and took a deep breath. He couldn't let himself think about Nat now, or he'd spiral down again. The first few days after the battle had been a haze of grief and he couldn't afford to go back there right now. There was a job to do. Steve rubbed his eyes and forced himself to focus on the task at hand. He had to solve this mystery and make Buchanan real, or he wouldn't trust himself to set foot on that platform tomorrow.

The front door opened, and instinctively Steve waved his hand across the holographic display to whisk the information on Buchanan out of sight. Morgan came bursting in, holding the hem of her shirt rolled up as if there was something inside. Pepper and Happy were right behind her.

"I caught a frog!" Morgan announced cheerfully, running over to Steve and opening up the folds of her shirt to show him. Instantly the frog leaped out and landed splay-legged on the floor. Morgan shrieked and danced away from it, and then edged forward, clearly torn by her desire to catch the frog again and her nervousness about its unpredictable behavior. Quickly, Steve scooped up the frog and held it cupped in his hands.

"Got it," he said. Morgan grinned at him.

"Morgan, go find a box for it, quick," Pepper said, shooing the girl toward the garage. "Don't make Steve sit there holding the slimy thing." Happy went to help her.

"I used to hunt frogs at my cousin's house as a kid," Steve said, peering between his fingers at the frog inside, strangely relieved by the interruption to his investigation. "They don't bother me."

"Well, I told her ten times to put it back in the water," Pepper said, sitting down and sighing. "But the weather's starting to change, and she didn't want it to freeze to death in the lake."

"Frogs don't freeze to death in the winter," Steve said.

Pepper frowned. "Really? I thought they laid their eggs and then died."

Steve nodded. "They hibernate in the mud. They can even get partially frozen - they stop breathing, their heart stops beating - but in the spring they warm up again and come back to life."

Pepper nodded absent-mindedly, clearly not giving Steve her full attention anymore. She had a tendency to drift in and out of conversations lately, particularly when Morgan wasn't around. She could talk and smile and put on a show of normalcy for her daughter, but at other times she was distant and silent. Steve couldn't exactly blame her. He knew something of the loss she was feeling. Like half your soul was missing.

Morgan came running back into the room, clutching a shoebox, followed by Happy. Carefully Steve tipped the frog into the box and closed the lid. Happy helped Morgan poke some holes into the box and then sent her to wash her hands and put her pajamas on. Morgan was sleeping in Pepper's room, and Steve was staying in Morgan's room because Happy was already in the guest room. Steve had intended to find his own place right away, but Pepper had pressed him to stay at least until the Stones had been returned, insisting repeatedly that she didn't mind sharing a bed with her daughter. It was clear that she didn't want to sleep alone, although she hadn't come out and said that, and so Steve had agreed to stay a while. It was better to have more people around to guard the Stones, anyway, just in case.

And, if Steve had to admit it, he didn't really want to be alone right now, either.

He knew if would be easier for Happy and Pepper to get Morgan to bed if he wasn't around to distract her, so he said goodnight to everyone and shut himself up in the bedroom. He stood still for a moment, looking around at the toys and books without really seeing them. He was tired, mentally and physically, yet he couldn't stop thinking about Peggy's husband. If only he had access to more information than what Friday could give him.

After a few minutes' thought, it finally hit him. There was another former S.H.I.E.L.D. employee in his social circle now. And even better, it was someone who had known Peggy personally. With renewed energy, he pulled out his cell phone and dialed up his newest contact.

"Hello?" a man's voice answered promptly.

"Hank Pym? Steve Rogers."

"Oh, yes. Captain Rogers." Steve hadn't spent much time with Hank Pym, but the scientist had quickly made a good impression on him. The man was quietly competent and more than willing to help them complete this last mission, despite not knowing anyone in the group except Scott Lang.

"I've completed four vials of Pym Particles," Dr. Pym said, "and if you give me another 12 hours I can give you another four. I thought it would be best to send extras, in case something goes wrong again." Dr. Pym had taken it in surprisingly good humor when Steve had apologized to him for stealing Pym Particles from him in the 1970s. "I'm just relieved it wasn't Howard Stark, like I suspected at the time," Pym had said with a gravelly chuckle. "I'd have slept a lot better that night knowing my work was in the hands of Captain America instead." Steve had refrained from mentioning that Howard's son had also used some of the stolen particles to return to the present day. No point in poking a hornet's nest, when what was done was already done.

"That's good to hear, Dr. Pym," Steve said. "Listen, I wanted to ask you a question. You knew Peggy Carter back in the day, didn't you?"

"I left S.H.I.E.L.D. in 1988," Pym said. "And good riddance. But before that, yes, I knew Peggy Carter."

"You knew her well?"

"Well enough. We worked closely together for a number of years. She and my wife, Janet, got along well."

Steve took a deep breath. "Then you must have known her husband, Grant Buchanan."

There was a short pause. "No, I don't believe I ever met him."

Steve took a gamble. "But he worked at S.H.I.E.L.D., didn't he?"

"Not that I know of. Peggy never mentioned it. Janet?"

Steve heard a woman's voice in the background: "I think she said he was an artist. He must have been eccentric, or maybe a bit of a loner. He never came to any of the agency receptions, at least not the ones we attended. Peggy always said he preferred staying home."

"Why do you ask?" Hank Pym asked.

"Just curious," Steve said quickly. "Call me when you finish making the particles, all right? Dr. Banner finished building the quantum tunnel today, and the sooner we get the Stones where they belong, the better."

"Sure thing."

Disappointed, Steve ended the call and rubbed his chin thoughtfully. He had really hoped Hank Pym could give him something useful. Well, there was one other thing to try, although it was a long shot. Peggy had told the Smithsonian interviewer that her husband was among the soldiers Captain America and the Howling Commandoes had rescued from the blizzard siege at Volgograd. Steve himself had no memory of meeting any Lieutenant Buchanan, but then his interactions had been mostly confined to the battalion's commanding officer. He hadn't had a chance to talk to the men.

"Friday, show me the photos of Captain America with the survivors of Volgograd, the ones they used for all those..." Steve paused to control the distaste in his voice. "...those propaganda reels."

Multiple photos popped up in the holographic display, all in black and white. There he was in many of them, in the old spangled uniform, flanked by Bucky and various other Howling Commandoes, with crowds of cheering men on all sides. Steve studied the photos for a few minutes and realized that no one had ever attempted to caption them with the names of all those soldiers. Maybe Buchanan was here, just not labeled.

"Friday, run facial recognition on everyone in these photos," he said, "and cross-reference them with the names and records of the men known to have survived this campaign. Let me know if you find any anomalies."

That seemed like a tall order, but in less than a minute Friday responded. "All individuals in the photos are identified and accounted for, Captain Rogers. None of them correspond to Buchanan."

Steve was growing more confused by the minute.

Even as he reached for his kimoyo beads and slipped them on his wrist, he wondered why he was being so tenacious about this. Did it really matter that Peggy's husband was so elusive? The important thing was that he had made her happy. He had given her a family. Steve had no right to even think about going back to 1945 to take it all away, just because he saw Peggy in 1970 and lost his head for a minute.

His shoulders sagged. Who was he kidding? Lost his head for a minute? He lost his head every time he saw or heard anything that reminded him of Peggy, and the 12 years he had spent apart from her hadn't dulled his reactions in the slightest. The first time Wanda had laid eyes on him and probed him for weakness, she had instantly identified his connection with Peggy as his point of greatest vulnerability. He couldn't get on a plane without looking at her photo in his compass. He couldn't see Clint with his wife or Tony with his without thinking of Peggy. He couldn't look at Morgan without thinking of what should have been. The reality was, he was not going to be able to drop this investigation until he had a satisfactory answer.

It took Bucky a minute to answer his call on the kimoyo beads, but finally his holographic head and torso rose up from Steve's palm.

"Is this it?" Bucky asked. "Gearing up to go?"

"Not quite," Steve said. "We're still waiting for Pym Particles. Listen, I wanted to talk to you about the day we liberated the 97th Battalion at Volgograd."

Bucky snorted. "Steve, sometimes you really are an old man. Are you seriously calling me up to trade war stories right now? Do you realize it's the middle of the night here in Wakanda?"

"Do you remember it?" Steve repeated patiently.

"It was the last mission we did together that didn't end in my so-called death. Yeah, I remember it. What about it?"

"Do you remember meeting an Army lieutenant by the name of Grant Edward Buchanan?"

Bucky thought for a moment. "Not really. Why, who was he?"

"You ID'd all the men and sent the list of survivors to Command, didn't you?"

Bucky exhaled explosively. "Steve, there were _hundreds_ of our boys there. Yeah, I wrote down their names and read them into a radio receiver, but that was 70 years ago. I don't _remember_ any of them."

"Bucky, this is important."

"Why? Who was he?"

Steve sighed. "Peggy married him. After the war."

"Oh." Bucky was quiet for a moment. "Grant Edward Buchanan? It isn't really ringing a bell. Although," he added slowly, "you'd think I'd remember a guy who shared a name with me. Have you looked at those old photos? Maybe he's in one of them."

"I tried that," Steve said. "I can't find any proof that he was there at all. The only evidence is his Distinguished Service certificate that lists that campaign."

Bucky made a sound of disgust. "Maybe he wasn't there. Maybe he was one of those heels who steals valor."

"Peggy couldn't have fallen in love with a man like that," Steve said quickly.

"Maybe she didn't know."

"She wasn't stupid," Steve shot back. "She founded an intelligence agency, remember?"

A short silence fell.

"He's a ghost," Steve murmured, pinching the bridge of his nose. "It's like he doesn't even exist."

"Steve, is there a point to this?" Bucky said, not ungently. "Or are you torturing yourself over Peggy just for the fun of it?"

Steve sighed. "I have to go."

"Hold up, Steve, wait-" Bucky said.

"I'll talk to you later."

Steve deactivated the beads. It was late, he was frustrated and tired, and tomorrow was going to be a long day. He really needed to stop chasing ghosts, and go to sleep. Slowly, he undressed, lay down on the bed, and waited for his swirling thoughts to begin to settle. He stared at the stuffed animals Morgan had lined up along the shelves for a while, and then reached up to switch off the lamp. Darkness flooded the room.

"A ghost," he murmured. "Peggy married a ghost." Slowly, his eyes closed, and he drifted off to sleep.

* * *

Some hours later, his eyes opened.

He was instantly wide awake, although the house was still dark and silent. Steve permitted himself a moment of regret that he wouldn't get a good night's rest tonight, but insomnia had become an old friend of his over the years, and he knew there was no point to staying in bed. So he got up and quietly slipped out the door and padded into the living room. He sat on the couch and ran his hands through his hair, smoothing it down. The doors to Pepper's room and the guest room were closed. Everything was quiet.

He sat there for a while, letting his thoughts take their natural course. He was still unsettled by the strange gaps in Buchanan's records. He couldn't stop thinking about the fact that here was a man only a few months older than him, born and raised in the same borough of New York City, who crossed paths with him in Volgograd, and finally met the love of his life and married her, and yet Steve could not find any concrete traces of him. Was he a S.H.I.E.L.D. spy? Had he really stolen valor? Both? Neither?

Steve got up and went to stand by the holographic display table. "Friday?" he murmured as quietly as he could, not wanting to wake anyone up.

"You should be sleeping, Captain." Friday kept her voice down, too.

"I slept for 66 years, I've had my fill of it," Steve said grimly. "Friday, I have to know. Is there any evidence at all to believe that Lieutenant Buchanan's war service was a falsehood?"

"Analyzing."

Steve paced the floor in his bare feet, waiting. Before long, Friday responded quietly.

"Here's something. The handwriting on Buchanan's certificate of valor matches the groom's signature on the marriage license."

Steve blinked, stunned. "You mean... it's forged?"

He sat limply in a chair. So Bucky had been right? Buchanan had created his own certificate of valor. He'd lied about his service in the war. And somehow Peggy had been ignorant of that fact.

"It gets stranger, Captain," Friday added. "It's the same handwriting on his birth certificate, too."

Steve struggled to keep up. "He wrote his own _birth certificate_? Are you sure?"

The documents popped up on the holographic display. "Handwriting analysis indicates an 82 percent chance all three documents were written by the same person, although it looks like there was some attempt to disguise it. Oh, and look. His application for GI benefits. Same handwriting again."

Steve stood hastily and waved his hands to zoom in on a line from each of the documents, thinking to compare them for himself. But he had only looked at one of the lines of cursive before he felt the blood drain from his face.

"_What_...?" he hissed.

Steve leaned on the table to steady himself, his head feeling so light it seemed to be disconnected from his body.

"It's my handwriting," Steve said breathlessly. "It's _mine_..."

His eyes drifted up to the date at the corner of the GI benefits application. November 5, 1945. He had gone under the ice in March of that year. On November 5, he had been as good as dead. And while he was asleep, buried under a metric ton of Arctic ice, he had apparently been in New Jersey forging documents for Peggy's husband at the exact same time.

_I'm going crazy,_ he thought, and as if in confirmation he could feel his hands and feet going strangely numb. _They were afraid I'd be unbalanced, waking up after 66 years of sleeping under the ice, but it took this many years for my mind to finally snap._

"I have a sample of your handwriting, Captain Rogers," Friday said helpfully, pulling up a holographic photo of his signature scrawled across a Captain America trading card. "I can confirm. It's a match."

And then, stilling the trembling that had swept through his body, Steve saw the whole picture in a sudden flash of insight. Grant Edward Buchanan really _was_ a ghost. He didn't exist at all, except as a creation of Steve's. A creation he had apparently not created yet... but would sometime in his future.

As if from a long distance away, he was hearing Bruce's explanation again: _"You can't change the past. If you travel to the past, that past becomes your future. Your former present becomes the past, which can't now be changed by your future." _Steve hadn't fully understood it before, simply accepting it on the faith he had in Bruce's brilliant mind, but now it all made sense. His future was _in the past_. It always had been. He just didn't know it until this moment. And this life he had lived in the future as an Avenger, a man out of time... it was about to become his past. And nothing he could do in his future could possibly undo what he'd already done in his past, even if he had apparently lived his life backwards from the rest of the world.

The lake house was dark and silent, and its occupants slept on, but for Steve the sun was breaking through the clouds, throwing a dazzling light into his eyes. The world's past was his future.

1945...

"I was there," he said out loud. He ran his hand through his hair in amazement. "The whole time... _I was there_!"

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_I welcome feedback! Let me know what you thought._


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Steve didn't sleep the rest of the night, but for once he didn't care. There were so many things to research, so many plans to make. Excitement permeated every cell in his body, and it was all he could do not to telegraph it to everyone in the house when they began to wake up. They were all sitting there eating breakfast when a distant roar let them know that a Quinjet was arriving on the property.

Steve strode out to meet the new arrival. It turned out to be Bucky, who emerged from the Quinjet with a large round leather case tucked under his arm.

"I brought something for you," Bucky said, holding out the case toward Steve. "Three guesses what's inside, and the first two don't count."

Steve took the case and opened it up. Inside was his shield, shiny and perfect, freshly painted with the old familiar design. Steve ran his hand over the bright star in the center and smiled a little.

"I found most of the pieces on the battlefield," Bucky said. "Shuri herself reforged it for you. She wanted to add a bunch of bells and whistles to it, but I think I managed to convince her to keep it simple. A simple shield for a simple guy." He clapped Steve's shoulder. "Right?"

"Thanks, Bucky." Steve felt a pulse of regret, and his smile faded. He would never use this shield. He wouldn't need it, where he was going.

Bucky scrutinized him carefully and said, "You're really gonna do it, aren't you?"

Steve glanced up at him. "Do what?"

"Were you even planning to say goodbye? I mean, I know how much you hate having people make a fuss over you, but come on."

Steve tucked the shield back into its case and sealed it shut. "You do realize I'll only be gone for 5 seconds, right? From your perspective."

"Don't give me that. I know what you're thinking. It was the first thing I thought, when I got undusted and everyone told me they built a time machine while I was gone."

Steve didn't say anything.

"And besides," Bucky continued, "I think it's a pretty crazy coincidence that that guy you were asking about last night - Grant Edward Buchanan? - had your middle name for a first name, and my middle name for a last name."

"Every other kid in America was named after a president in those days," Steve said.

Bucky ignored this and kept going. "The Edward part had me stumped, I admit, but I just now noticed that big memorial over there." He pointed behind Steve. "'Sacred to the memory of Anthony _Edward_ Stark.' Interesting, don't you think?"

"Bucky..."

"Let's talk," Bucky said, suddenly serious. "Somewhere private."

* * *

"Wow," Bucky said. "Wow."

Steve stopped rowing and they glided to a stop in the middle of the lake, waves rippling away from them in an ever-widening circle.

"Wow," Steve agreed.

"And Friday confirmed it?"

"I was definitely there," Steve said.

Bucky shook his head in amazement. "You really did it. You married Peggy."

"I'm _going_ to marry her," Steve corrected.

"You had _kids_ with her."

"I'm _going_ to have-" Steve paused, feeling suddenly overwhelmed. "Holy cow, you're right. I'm going to be a _father_."

Bucky laughed shortly, looking at him in wonderment. "You jerk. You're gonna go live your whole life without us."

"You could come with me, you know."

"Nah," Bucky said. "Unlike you, I don't have a dish waiting for me there. And besides, I'm kind of used to things here now. You do remember, don't you, that they didn't have air conditioning in 1945?"

"I remember," Steve said.

"And the food was lousy."

"I know."

"No internet."

"They'll invent it again," Steve said.

"Are you going to tell the others?" Bucky asked.

Steve shrugged a little. "I don't want them making a fuss. And besides, everyone is already dealing with Tony, and Nat... they don't need to deal with me leaving, too."

"Except when you don't come back, they're going to figure it out. For all you know, they already suspect. I did."

"Maybe I _will_ be able to come back by then."

Bucky squinted at him. "What? How so?"

"If I'm still around by 2023, I'll come back and explain. It will be like I never left."

Bucky stared at him. "Except you'll be a doddering old man, if you're even still alive. That would make you... what? More than a hundred years old?"

"I'm not sure you and I are going to age like normal people," Steve said. "Look at me. I'm turning 40 next year. I don't look it, or feel it. Do you?"

"I know, but you can't guarantee that," Bucky objected. "Wait a minute. Wait a minute. If you looked up his records... your records..." He paused for a long time, suddenly uncertain. "Didn't it say when you died?"

"Supposedly I died in 2015, about a year before Peggy," Steve said. Bucky looked shocked, but before he could say anything, Steve pressed on: "But it might not have been true. All my other documents were fictions. I may have faked my own death, too."

"What on Earth for?"

"It would have solved certain problems," Steve said. "Like the fact that I was living longer than a human should. And I don't think I'm going to be able to go to Peggy's funeral again. I'm going to be there. The other me, I mean. I can't see me there, it would ruin everything."

Bucky was looking a lot more upset than Steve had expected him to be. "You don't know any of that," he said. "You're only guessing. We're not immortal. You might not be able to come back at all."

"Well, if I can't, then I'll send one of my kids or something," Steve said. "I'll send word somehow. I'll make sure I say my goodbyes to everyone, one way or another."

They sat in silence for a while.

"How many kids?" Bucky asked suddenly.

"I don't know. At least two." In response to Bucky's puzzled look, Steve explained: "I didn't look up my kids' lives. I don't even know their names; I just saw that one photo."

"What's the matter, you run out of curiosity?"

"It's bad enough that I already know how history's going to go," Steve said. "I'd like to preserve some sense of mystery in my personal life, at least."

"I guess." Bucky leaned his arm on the side of the boat. "Steve," he said, shaking his head. "I know you have to go, and I'm really, really happy for you. But I hate to see you go, too."

"I know," Steve said quietly. "I'll be sorry to leave."

"It isn't that I can't do without you," Bucky said, trying to smile, "it's that I don't know if the world can survive without Captain America."

"Maybe it doesn't have to," Steve said. "I'll be leaving my shield. Someone else could use it."

Bucky returned his meaningful gaze unsmilingly. "Don't look at me."

"I trust you."

Bucky sighed and stared moodily at the water. "_I_ don't."

"You should."

Bucky shook his head. "I'm not even American. I haven't been since the day I fell into the ravine. I was a Soviet, I was Hydra, and now it's Wakanda that's home. How could I be Captain America?"

"Well, what could be more American than immigrating from another country?"

"Don't joke. That isn't even really it. Steve, I'm... I'm broken."

"Don't say that, Bucky."

"Well, it's true. I'm better than I was, but the truth is... I'm not like you, Steve. I'm not a leader. You... you always did the right things for the right reasons. Even before you were Captain America. I could never be so... _pure_. The shield wouldn't hang on me right."

"Someday, it might."

Bucky leaned forward and took the oars from Steve. "Come on. If you're going to leave, then we're going to make this a day to remember."

* * *

As the day wore on, they began to gather together at the lake house, everyone who was left. Wanda, Bruce, Sam, Bucky, Pepper and Steve. Bucky didn't let on to anyone else what was happening, but he made sure that everything was to Steve's liking. It wasn't exactly a party, but everyone was quietly grateful for the lives that they'd saved, and it was good to be together with them one last time. That night, as they were sitting around the dinner table, Scott Lang arrived with the Pym Particles. He couldn't stay long, but before he left Steve made sure to pull him aside and thank him for kick-starting the time heist and assisting with the battle.

"The honor was mine, Captain America," Scott said with feeling, shaking his hand too vigorously and too long. "Gosh, I never thought I'd get to be a teammate to one of my own personal heroes."

"You can call me Steve," Steve said. "I consider you a friend, not just a teammate."

Scott was speechless for a moment. "Wow," he said. "Wow. Hey, does that mean you'll autograph this?" He unbuttoned his jacket to reveal his T-shirt, adorned with an image of Captain America's shield. "It isn't really for me," he added quickly. "My daughter, you know, she's a... a big fan."

After Steve had signed the shirt and seen Scott off, he found Sam standing on the porch, holding two drinks. He held one out to Steve, and together they stood by the railing and looked out at the scenery.

"So what are your plans now?" Steve asked.

Sam shrugged. "I figure it's only a matter of time before some other idiot tries to take over the world or something. And we don't have a headquarters anymore. I've been thinking. Every time Stark built a big, nice central location for us, it got attacked by someone. I had this idea that maybe we should establish multiple bases, all around the world. Something low-profile that doesn't scream, 'I'm a target, come and challenge me.' We could move around as needed, depending on the needs of the mission."

Steve nodded approvingly. "That's a great idea. Where did you have in mind?"

"I've got a few ideas. I wanted to see what you thought."

"It's your idea," Steve said, "it's your project."

Sam seemed a little surprised, but he accepted it. "I'll get up a plan. That jerk with the metal arm said he'd help, so..." Sam shrugged again.

"You and Bucky work well together," Steve said. "I'm glad to see it."

"Yeah, well, don't get ahead of yourself. I still haven't forgiven him for ripping the steering wheel out of my car," Sam said. He glanced back through the screen door and saw Bucky standing in the kitchen, talking to Bruce. "Hey, Bucky!" Sam called out. "You hear that? You still owe me a new car!"

"I don't have any money," Bucky shot back petulantly.

"Man, don't give me that. You live on top of a vibranium mine!" Sam gestured meaningfully. "Get me one of those cars like Shuri builds. That'll just about do it."

"Dream on, winged freak." Bucky turned away dismissively.

Sam grinned broadly, looked back over at Steve, and held out his glass.

"To the next adventure," Sam said.

Steve smiled knowingly, and tapped their glasses together. "To the next adventure."

* * *

They agreed to send Steve off first thing in the morning to return the Stones. As the sun went down and everyone began to disperse for the night, Steve slipped out the door and headed down the path alone. There was one more person to say goodbye to.

Pepper was already standing at the memorial when Steve came around a bend in the path. He stopped, not wanting to disturb her, but Pepper saw him and quickly called out.

"Steve, don't go," she said. "I wouldn't mind company."

He joined her under the pavilion, and they both turned to face Tony's memorial. For a few minutes they stood there with their own thoughts, the only sound the chirping of the crickets in the underbrush.

"I'm gonna miss him," Steve said at last.

"He missed you, too," Pepper said, "those years you were in hiding."

"He was furious with me," Steve said.

"Yes," Pepper agreed readily. "And with himself. But that phone you sent him... he carried it around with him everywhere he went. He just... couldn't make the call."

"I feel like we talked past each other a lot," Steve said slowly. "We grew up so differently. I don't just mean generationally. I was raised by a widowed mother. We never had much. Whenever I wore holes in the soles of my shoes, I had to put newspapers in the bottom to try to make it last longer. And Tony... when Coulson first told me who he was and what he did, I figured he was one of those guys who had had everything handed to him in life."

He shook his head. "But I was wrong. His life was no easier than anyone else's. It took me a long time, too long, to realize that Tony worked harder than anyone I've ever seen. He earned everything he had. And he was more generous with his money than anyone I've ever met. I didn't give him enough credit for that."

Pepper nodded slowly. "I understand. But you shouldn't feel bad about it, Steve. I think Tony misjudged you too, before he'd ever even met you. He'd grown up listening to his dad constantly talking about how wonderful you were - of all his projects, the project he was proudest of - and Howard didn't ever say much about Tony himself. I think it was a hard pill for him to swallow, feeling like he was expected to compete with Captain America, someone who was a... a..."

"A fiction," Steve said matter-of-factly. "A propaganda tool."

"It was bad enough when you were that," Pepper said. "But then you came back to life. And everyone at S.H.I.E.L.D., everyone on the Avengers team, they instantly loved you and followed you. Because you _weren't_ propaganda, you were the real thing. You were exactly what your reputation suggested. He didn't expect that, and..." She reached out and squeezed Steve's hand. "Tony never admitted it, not even to me, but even _he_ couldn't help but look up to you. He trusted you, maybe even more than he trusted himself. That's why he got so crazy when the two of you disagreed on things. It made him doubt himself."

"I never intended that."

"I know." Pepper sighed. "I fought with him all the time, too, you know. He admitted himself that he was a handful. But he wouldn't have wasted his time scuffling with us if he hadn't cared about us."

"He was... one-of-a-kind," Steve said. "Pepper, I'm so sorry."

"I'll survive," she said, although her eyes were as moist as his. "Life goes on, whether we're ready for it or not. He did what he wanted. He saved everyone. He saved me."

_She was his Peggy_, Steve realized, watching Pepper as she rested her palms and her forehead on the cool granite of the memorial. _That's what it was all along._ Tony's obsession with perfecting his armor, his desperate efforts to create Ultron, to build a suit of armor around the world... as misguided as his actions sometimes were, Tony was just trying to save his Peggy, and everyone else's, too.

_I should have told him about her._

After a while, Pepper told him good night and slowly walked back to the house. Steve stood there, motionless. It was too late to have this conversation with Tony. Or, maybe it wasn't. Steve ran his eyes over the graven words on the memorial and knew he had to try.

"Tony-"

It was surprisingly easy, like a rubber band snapping inside his chest. Suddenly everything came out in a rush.

"I used to think you thought too much of yourself, and not enough of others," Steve said. "But you changed. You proved me wrong. And even when you quit the Avengers... for the last few years you lived the kind of life I always wanted for myself. I don't think you were selfish. You became a 'we' instead of a 'me,' you and Pepper and Morgan. It was good for you, and for them. It was a different way of saving the world."

Steve reached down into his pocket and pulled out his compass. Opening the lid, he showed the photo inside to Tony. "This is Peggy. She was..." He cleared his throat. "She was my Pepper. You remember that day at Clint's place, when we were chopping wood? You said you wanted to end the team, so we could all go home. And I was furious with you, because I didn't have any home to go to. The Avengers were all I had. You didn't know that. You didn't know because I didn't tell you. You've always worn your heart on your sleeve, and I just... I don't like talking about myself. I couldn't talk about Peggy. It hurt too much. I wish I had told you. I think you would have understood better than I thought." He swallowed painfully. "I'm gonna miss you, Tony. I'm sorry... about everything. And thank you... for everything."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

Reviews welcome! Let me know what you think.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's note: **Thank you to Basil Allegri, matrix, Kallie49, Guest, Historian1912, Nzie, Speed Reader, aira nabihah and Sophia the Scribe for your kind reviews!

**Chapter 4**

Steve and Bucky went out early in the morning, before anyone else left the house, and silently Bucky watched as Steve carefully leaned his shield, still in its case, against the bench that overlooked the lake near the site of the Quantum Tunnel.

They stood there for a while, looking at it. Steve hadn't expected to feel this much peace about leaving it behind. He had loved his second life; he had loved being Captain America, but this felt right. It was time to let go.

He looked over at Bucky. His friend was intently scanning the surrounding trees.

"I don't see anyone," Bucky said. "Shouldn't someone be here by now?"

A breeze stirred up, ruffled their hair, and died back down.

"Steve?" Bucky called out loudly, his voice echoing across the lake.

They waited. The only reply was the distant honking of geese flying overhead. Bucky looked at him, almost accusing.

"Someone will come," Steve said.

* * *

It didn't take long to make the final preparations. When everything was ready, Steve went back to the lake house, said goodbye to Pepper, Happy and Morgan, and picked up the case with the Infinity Stones in one hand and Mjolnir in the other.

Wanda followed him outside, but they hadn't gone far when she suddenly stopped in the middle of the path.

"Steve-" Wanda said, and he turned toward her. Quickly, she embraced him tightly. "I can't watch you go," she said brokenly in his ear. "Good luck." Kissing him on the cheek, she released him and then swiftly walked down the path back to the house.

Bruce was there in the clearing when Steve arrived.

"I think we're about ready," Bruce said, glancing up from the bank of arc reactors he had just connected. "Where's Wanda?"

"Not coming," Steve said.

"Steve... I don't know. I'm having second thoughts about this," Bruce said. "Maybe I should come with you after all. I don't like the idea of you taking this on alone."

"I won't be alone," Steve said, raising Mjolnir meaningfully. "Thor is going with me."

He meant it in more than just a symbolic way. Mjolnir might channel the power of Thor, but there was more to it than that. When Steve held it, he could feel a tugging on his mind. It wasn't just a weapon, it was almost... alive, and it wanted to cooperate with him. It wanted to show him how to do whatever he wanted to do. Using it for the first time had been surprisingly intuitive. Most of all, there was a distinct Thor-ness to the feel of the hammer. As though Thor's personality had been imprinted on it after so many years of use.

"Mjolnir likes you, Steve," Thor had said as they said their goodbyes before he left with the Guardians of the Galaxy. There had been no trace of his old possessiveness over his beloved weapon; Thor had changed so much in the years they had known each other. "It suits your hand. I wish I could give it to you to keep, but it will have to go back to Asgard with the Reality Stone. It will have to be there for me when I need it."

"You're going to have to leave it after just a couple stops," Bruce pointed out now.

"You don't have to worry, Bruce," Steve said. "I'm not going to rest until I have everything back where it needs to be. I won't fail."

Bruce sighed and shook his head. "Of all the mysteries inside you, Steve Rogers, I wish I knew where you pull all that confidence from."

"The same place you found the courage to do _that_," Steve said, gesturing at Bruce's body. "When we don't have what we need to do what has to be done, we create it."

Bruce was mollified, and he thumped Steve's back in a rough farewell, hard enough to make him stagger a little. Inwardly, Steve smiled. Of course, today it was more than just his boundless optimism that told him he would succeed. He wouldn't dream of going home before he completed his mission, and since he already knew he _had_ gone home...

Sam and Bucky joined them in the clearing. Steve set down the case and the hammer.

**"**Remember," Bruce said. "You have to return the stones at the exact moment you got them. Or you're gonna open up a bunch of nasty alternative realities."

"Don't worry, Bruce," Steve said. "Clip all the branches."

"You know, if you want, I can come with you," Sam offered.

Steve smiled. "You're a good man, Sam. This one's on me, though." He looked over at Bucky. "Don't do anything stupid 'till I get back."

"How can I?" Bucky asked, trying to smile. "You're taking all the stupid with you."

They hugged, and Bucky murmured for his ears alone: "Gonna miss you, buddy."

"It's gonna be okay, Buck," Steve replied quietly. He stepped back and touched his wrist controls. The Quantum Suit's nanoparticles deployed, flowing like liquid over his clothing. He picked up the case and the hammer, and stepped onto the platform.

"How long is this gonna take?" Sam asked.

"For him? As long as he needs," Bruce replied. "For us, five seconds." He stood by the controls and glanced over at Steve. "Ready, Cap?" Steve nodded. "All right. We'll meet you back here, okay?"

"You bet," Steve said, locking eyes with Bucky.

"Going quantum," Bruce said. "Three... two... one..."

The helmet snapped shut, and the clearing vanished from sight, along with all his friends.

* * *

Steve jumped off the Chitauri chariot he'd "borrowed" and somersaulted onto the Sanctum's rooftop's garden, landing on his feet with the case for the Stones firmly gripped in one hand. In the distance, a Leviathan surrounded by a swarm of Chitauri were laying waste to the blocks surrounding Stark Tower, but here in Greenwich Village the chaos was only a distant clamor.

A woman was standing directly in front of him as though she were waiting for him: completely bald, and wearing saffron-yellow robes. Just as Bruce had described her. Steve tapped his wrist control, and his Quantum Suit's nanoparticles retracted into their housing unit around his wrist, leaving him dressed in the slacks and button-up shirt he had worn underneath the suit.

"Ancient One?" he asked.

"Captain America," she said soberly.

He blinked, surprised that she had recognized him so quickly. It was only after the Battle for New York that his existence in modern times had been publicized, and right now he didn't even have his uniform or shield.

"Did Dr. Banner just leave?" he asked, hoping he had timed his arrival correctly.

"Yes," the Ancient One said. "I was expecting him to return himself. Did he... not survive, then?"

"He did," Steve assured her. "The task of returning the Stones fell to me."

He opened the case and held it out to her. It was empty of all but the Time Stone.

The Ancient One looked relieved to see it. She stretched out her hand, and the green gem rose smoothly into the air, hovering between her thumb and forefinger. A flick of her hand, and it embedded itself into the heavy amulet she wore around her neck: the Eye of Agamotto. "Your mission was successful, then?" she asked, fixing her intense blue gaze on him.

Steve nodded. "Everything is back where - and when - it should be."

"Good." The Ancient One gestured with both hands, and the Eye closed, swallowing up the light of the Time Stone. Steve permitted himself to breathe a sigh of relief. It had been a terrible burden to carry the Stones, and he was glad it was over. With any luck, he'd never see one again.

A sustained roar reverberated in the air, and Steve looked up at the sky in time to see a bright flash of light speed by, high above them. With a start, he realized in that split second that it was Tony in his Iron Man suit, shouldering a nuclear missile. Steve shaded his eyes and gazed into the direction Tony was traveling, quickly spotting the space portal directly over Stark Tower. Tony was headed straight for it.

_You're not the guy to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you. _

Steve had never been more glad to be wrong. 2012 was in good hands. So was 2023. Tony had bought him his chance for a third life, and he would never forget.

Steve set down the empty case, and looked at the spacetime GPS on the back of his hand. A thrill went through him, part anticipation, part worry. This was it. Next stop, 1945. He closed his eyes a moment, willing himself to be calm. He hoped he hadn't miscalculated anything. Suppose he arrived only to discover that he had somehow misinterpreted the information he'd found? Suppose it was all a big mistake?

"Having second thoughts, Captain America?"

Steve opened his eyes again and frowned. The Ancient One was watching him closely, head cocked to one side. Could she know what he was planning? After all, she had been in possession of the Time Stone for a very long time, according to Dr. Strange. She must have seen many things with it.

"You can see the future," he said slowly.

"Some of it," she answered. "Its possibilities, at least."

"And the past?"

"All of it." Her tone was matter-of-fact.

He met the Ancient One's gaze. "If I were about to do something stupid," he said, "would you warn me?"

"Oh, I'd do much more than warn you," she said coolly. "I'd _stop_ you."

Quick as a flash, her hand darted out and yanked the nanoparticle housing unit from Steve's wrist. Before he could even react, she made another quick motion, pressing an unexpectedly firm fist against his chest. She was much, much stronger than a woman her size had any right to be, and Steve felt himself flying backward helplessly through the air.

The next moment, to his horror, he realized that he could _see himself falling _in front of his own eyes as if in slow-motion, until his body fell to the ground as heavily as a sack of potatoes. He stared at the Ancient One in shock as she stood there in a graceful pose, arm outstretched, gazing at him as serenely as though this were something she did every day.

Steve looked down at his body, lying on the ground with eyes closed as if asleep, and then looked down at his own self, which was translucent and glowing with a strange light.

His feet weren't touching the ground.

There was some part of him that wanted to panic about this fact, but just before he did, Steve noticed something that was so unexpected that he forgot for a moment that he had apparently just been knocked out of his own body. The part of him that was floating, the part of him that was still aware... he was small again. Like the old Steve Rogers. Painfully thin, short and fragile. He even appeared to wearing the old style of button-up shirt and suspenders, like he'd just stepped out of the 1940s.

It pulled him up so short that all he could do was look at the Ancient One and ask her seriously: "How did you do that?"

She looked down at him - yes, she was definitely taller that him now - and said with a hint of bemusement, "Most people go into shock when I push their astral bodies out of their physical forms."

Steve gestured at his supine body laying on the roof of the Sanctum. "I'm used to sleeping through important events," he said. "And I've always known what I really am on the inside." He glanced down at his diminutive ghostly form.

"Which is?" she asked.

Steve shrugged one thin shoulder. "I'm just a kid from Brooklyn."

The Ancient One cocked her head. "Well, not anymore, surely." She fixed her light blue eyes on him, searching his face. "Past, future, present... you're everywhere I look, Steven Rogers. Always changing things, _usually_ for the better."

"I don't suppose you saw me in 1945?"

Her faint smile faded. "You're not going to use the Quantum Tunnel to get to 1945."

"The thing is," Steve said, "I think I already did."

"Yes, that's just what you said last time," she said with a touch of weariness.

Steve creased his brow in confusion. "Last time?"

"The last time you entered 1945 through the Quantum Realm," the Sorcerer Supreme said, her voice rising in tone, "and triggered a spatial paradox, resulting in a branch in the flow of time, in which you inadvertently started World War III in a new and rather unpleasant alternate future."

Steve stared at her in shock. "I did all that?"

"Oh, yes," the Ancient One said. "Well, that is what happens when you muck about with time, not knowing what you're doing."

Steve shifted uncomfortably, or maybe it was just the breeze that was making his soul undulate. "Sorry."

The Ancient One's face softened a bit. "Yours was hardly the first terrible future I had to unravel," she said, "and it won't be the last. It comes with the territory, as keeper of the Eye."

"What did I do wrong?" Steve asked. "Stephen Strange told us he traveled backward through time. He reversed the destruction of Hong Kong. And nothing like that happened."

The Ancient One held his gaze steadily. "Did he use a Quantum Tunnel?"

"I guess not. He probably used the Time Stone."

"And presumably, he knew what he was doing."

"Well-"

"Time is a delicate thing," she said sternly. "Any time you tamper with natural law, you risk breaking it. Your_ science_-" She held up the nanoparticle housing unit she'd taken from him, holding it between two fingers as though it were something distasteful. "-can't put the pieces back together. Returning the Stones was one thing. For each trip you made, there was an Infinity Stone present to return the flow of reality to normal. Now you're trying to take a trip without anything to heal the dimensional breaches you're about to create."

"Oh," he said, crestfallen.

"On the other hand," she continued, her voice a little softer, "you weren't wrong to try. After all, it is the time you were meant to live in."

She made an imperious beckoning gesture with her hand, and abruptly Steve felt himself rushing back into his body. The Ancient One stooped to give him a hand back up. He dusted himself off, grateful to be back in one piece.

"But if you won't let me-" Steve began.

"I won't let you use _this_," the Ancient One said, waggling the nanoparticle housing unit at him, and then tucking it out of sight inside her sash with an air of finality.

"However..." she continued thoughtfully, pacing around him, "if you were to return via the Time Stone, the Stone could simultaneously be used to seal any dimensional cracks that may open in the process."

Steve's eyes flicked down to the Eye of Agamotto hanging around her neck. "I wouldn't really know how to do all that."

"Well, I wasn't offering to let you try," she said with a hint of amusement. "This sort of thing is best left to the professionals, don't you think?" She made a graceful gesture, and the Eye slid open once more, revealing the emerald light within.

The Ancient One cupped her hands loosely, and a green latticework of glowing runes formed around her wrists. She stepped close to him, focusing the green disc in her hands toward him.

"Once it's done, it's done," she said. "There's no changing your mind."

Steve nodded firmly. "I'm ready."

"No mistakes," the Sorcerer Supreme said. "Don't attempt to do anything you already know you didn't do in the past."

Steve narrowed his eyes. "Such as?"

Her mouth tightened. "Such as rooting Hydra out of S.H.I.E.L.D. too early. Or rescuing James Barnes from the Soviets before his time. You must respect natural law. Just because you're a time traveler doesn't mean you get to deny the rest of humanity their free will, no matter how much you want to prevent suffering." She paused to emphasize her next words. "A wise man once said, 'Every time someone tries to prevent a war before it starts, innocent people die.' You don't want to see that principle in action on a cosmic scale, believe me."

Steve nodded. "I understand. I promise."

"Good."

Slowly, she rotated her wrists, and the runes encircling her wrists turned in sync with her movements. An emerald haze descended over Steve's vision, and when it cleared, he was standing alone on the rooftop of the Sanctum.

Blinking, disoriented, he looked around. The Chitauri were gone from the sky, but the atmosphere wasn't exactly peaceful. He could hear honking horns on the street below. He strode over to the edge and looked over.

It was a busy day in New York City. People crowded the sidewalks, and cars passed back and forth along the road. But the cars were... Steve leaned over the railing and breathed faster in excitement. He could see a Hudson Commodore. And a Ford Super Deluxe. In fact, all of the cars were antiques. And there was the 3rd Avenue El, which had long ago been decommissioned, chuffing along on its elevated tracks. And yes, there were definitely some buildings missing from the skyline now.

A smile slowly spread across his face. "I made it," he whispered.

"Ah. Right on time."

Steve whirled around. The Ancient One was emerging from the stairwell and coming toward him. But she was wearing a different robe this time.

"Ancient One," he said, bowing his head slightly. "I can't thank you enough for what you've done for me."

"Captain America," she said. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you. I'll look forward to seeing you again, in the future." She looked him over seriously. "Well, if you'd like, I can help you get a bus pass to New Jersey. But if you're in a rush..."

She produced a small metal bar from within her robes, and slid two fingers into the loops attached to it. Turning to point her hand at the empty space on the rooftop, she moved her other hand in a smooth circle, and a sparking golden circle opened up in midair. Satisfied, the Ancient One turned back to him.

"First door you see," she said.

"Thank you," he said, and very nearly gave into the impulse to give the venerable and dignified Ancient One an enthusiastic hug, pulling himself back just in time and seizing her hand in a tight handshake instead.

"Oh, go on," she said, gently shoving him away.

Taking a deep breath, he stepped through the portal, and into his third life.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_I'd love to know what you think! Feel free to leave a review._


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Steve stepped out of the portal onto a quiet residential street and looked around.

The street was strewn with fallen leaves, and the air was crisp and chill. It was early morning, with the sun only just peeking over the horizon. Steve was facing a small beige house with a maple tree in the front yard, half its leaves still clinging to the branches. There was an icebox sitting on the front porch, next to the door. His heart beat a little faster. This was it. This was the place. Wheaton, New Jersey, not far from Camp Lehigh, where even now S.H.I.E.L.D. was being created, step by step.

He heard a thump not far away, and looked down the sidewalk to see a milkman strolling away from him with his handled box full of clinking bottles, having just delivered his wares to the little blue house next door.

"Hey, mister! Heads up!"

Steve turned to see a boy riding a bicycle toward him from the other direction. Quickly he stepped onto the front lawn, out of the way. As the boy whizzed past, he reached into the bag slung across his body and threw a rolled-up newspaper in Steve's direction. The toss was wild, heading straight for the roof, but instinctively Steve leapt up and caught it one-handed.

Startled by the unexpected feat, the boy wobbled on his bike and nearly fell off, but managed to get his wheels straight again and, after casting one last curious look in Steve's direction, pedaled furiously away.

Steve looked down at the newspaper he was clutching and unfolded it, searching for the date at the top of the page.

October 1, 1945.

He frowned. Why had the Ancient One sent him here so late? By now the war was over. He had been missing for months. Peggy must think him dead by now. Why...?

Then he remembered Peggy's grief, the day he had visited her home and she'd had a memory lapse, forgetting that Steve had ever been found alive. Her distress had been deep, and completely unfeigned.

_She had to believe me dead,_ he realized. _She had to grieve me. It had to be real. And now we'll have one more thing in common. We both know the emptiness of life without the other._

Steve was still frowning at the newspaper when he heard the grating of a screen door and the clink of a glass bottle. He looked up to see that a woman in a black blouse and skirt had emerged from the beige house and opened the icebox. She was just straightening up with a milk bottle in each hand.

Their eyes met.

_Peggy._

His lips formed the word, but no sound came out. He stood there frozen, and she stared at him, face blank at first, then her eyes suddenly widening in shock.

The milk bottles slipped out of her hands and shattered on the front porch, glass shards and milk exploding across her shoes and dripping down the steps.

"Peggy..." Steve said, and he found that he could move. He strode toward her, and she shakily made her way down the steps, heels crunching in the broken glass. In moments they reached each other, Steve reaching out to steady her. She put her hands on his chest, leaning on him for support as she wobbled slightly.

"Steve?" she said in disbelief, eyes searching his face hungrily. "You're... you're alive! You came back! You came back..." A sob closed off her throat, and a flood of tears overflowed her eyes.

"Well, I couldn't leave my best girl, now could I?" he said, eager to soothe her, but unable to stop a tear from spilling down his own cheek in response.

"I thought you were dead," she blurted out shakily. "I can't believe it, I can't..." She shook her head wildly. "I didn't let myself hope. Oh, Steve..."

She threw her arms around him and pressed her wet cheek against his. They stayed that way for a long time, until finally Peggy pulled back to look at him. Steve smiled a little, and reached up to push a wave of hair back from her eyes, wanting to get a good look at her.

The tears were ruining her makeup and the black dress she was wearing did not suit her at all, but all Steve could think was that Peggy was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. He was seized with a sudden impulse, and before he could stop himself, he bent down and kissed her.

She froze, dark eyes fixed on him.

"Sorry," Steve said quickly, a little dismayed at himself. "I didn't mean to do that so fast."

They stared at each other for a long moment. And then suddenly he was kissing her again, hard, and she was kissing him back, their arms wrapping desperately around each other like they would never let go.

Finally, bit by bit, they came back to the real world and pulled apart. Peggy held him by the shoulders and shook him a little, half-laughing, half-crying.

"Do you have any idea how long it's been?" She seemed torn between joy and fury. "Why didn't you call? Why didn't you write me? Where have you _been_?"

"I came as soon as I could," Steve said soothingly. "I know. It's been a long, long time."

"Six months," Peggy said indignantly. "You've been gone _six months!_"

"Longer," Steve said seriously. "A lifetime."

The front door to the house next door opened, and a man came out in his bathrobe to collect his milk bottles. Steve took Peggy by the elbow. "Inside," he said quickly, not wanting to be seen. She permitted him to lead her inside, stepping over the smashed remnants of the milk bottles on the porch.

"We have to call everyone," Peggy said eagerly once they were inside. "Colonel Phillips... and Howard... do you realize he has people in the Arctic _right now_, looking for Schmidt's plane? For you?" She started to move toward the phone on the wall.

"No," Steve said quickly, catching her by the arm again. "No, Peg, don't call them. I came to see you."

"But I'm supposed to go into work anyway," she said, glancing at the clock on the mantelpiece. "I have a meeting with them, and I'm about to be late..."

"Call in sick. Don't say anything about me. We need to talk."

Peggy appraised him for a moment. "All right," she said simply. He had almost forgotten how much her trust meant to him.

She made the call, and then looked at him expectantly as soon as she had hung up the receiver.

"This will be the first and last time I keep you from your work," Steve said.

"About that... I have so much to tell you, too," Peggy said eagerly. "My work has been changing since the war ended. We aren't just the SSR anymore. We're expanding our scope, bringing in more than just your country and mine. Our idea is to create a worldwide organization to protect the peace, so that we never have to fight a world war again. Hydra may be gone, but that doesn't mean something like it couldn't arise again. Next time, we mean to be ready."

"I couldn't be prouder of you," Steve said.

"We're naming it S.H.I.E.L.D.," she said. "In honor of you."

A thrill of anticipation went through him. It was going to be a pleasure, being here to watch Peggy give birth to S.H.I.E.L.D. True, one day he would have to tear it apart, at least for a time, but not before it had cultivated leaders like Nick Fury and Phil Coulson and Maria Hill. Scientists like Hank and Janet Pym and Erik Selvig. Operatives like Clint Barton and Natasha Romanoff. Good people who would defend the Earth from anything that might threaten it.

Not before it had given rise to the Avengers themselves. One day Peggy's work would lead directly to Thanos' downfall.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Peggy said with a puzzled laugh.

"Because I'm not the shield," Steve said quietly. "You are."

They settled down on the couch, and Peggy looked at him expectantly.

"You owe me a story," she said.

"It's a strange story," Steve said.

"Stranger than me making you a science experiment?"

Steve smiled a little, enjoying the ephemeral glimpse of her dimple he had just caught. "Do you remember that legend of a man who went to sleep in a clearing and when he woke up, it was 20 years later and he found out he'd slept through the whole Civil War?"

"Rip Van Winkle," Peggy said. "Yes." Her eyes smiled up at him. "But you didn't miss the whole war, Steve. Only the end."

"And you've seen 'The Wizard of Oz?' Where Dorothy traveled to a strange land, and all she wanted was to go back home, but it took her a long, long time to get there?"

Peggy laughed shortly. "Steve, don't you dare tell me you've been in Oz all this time," she teased.

He forged ahead. "And you know that old story by H.G. Wells, about a man who built a time machine and went to the future?"

"I always hated that story," Peggy said. "It depressed me. Steve, stop being so dramatic. For heaven's sake, tell me where you've _been_." She took his hand in hers.

"I _am_ telling you," Steve said. "The things that happened to me while I was gone were... fantastical. I'm not sure if you'll be able to believe me."

"I always believe you," Peggy said, reaching up to smooth back a strand of his hair. "At least, you've never lied to me before. Don't start now." She kissed his cheek.

Steve took a deep breath. "I want to show you something," he said. He fished around in his pocket until he found it. "Hold out your hand." He dropped the item into her open palm. She looked down at it, and then back up at him.

"A dime?" Peggy said.

"Look at it."

Peggy studied the face on the coin and raised her eyebrows.

"President Roosevelt," she said in surprise. "I read about this in the newspaper a few months ago. They said they were going to honor him with a new design. I hadn't realized they were already in circulation."

"They aren't. Look at the date," Steve said.

She did.

"1979..." Peggy said. She looked up at him, confused. "Steve, what is this? Where did you get this?"

"Peggy, I crashed my plane into the ocean."

"Yes, I know."

"I survived the crash. I should have died, but I didn't. I went to sleep in the ice. I slept there for a long time. The people who found me thought they were recovering a body. It must have scared the wits out of them when I turned out to be still alive."

"The serum..." Peggy said slowly. "It must have been the serum. We didn't realize it would affect you that way. When we didn't find you after a few days, we all assumed..." Her eyes grew moist.

"...the worst," Steve finished softly.

"How long were you there?" Peggy asked in wonderment. "Under the ice? Not this whole time, surely."

"A long time." He laughed humorlessly. "Longer than 'all this time.' More than a year."

Her face grew serious, eyes widening. "What do you mean?" she asked slowly. "It's October now. You only went missing in March."

He took her by the shoulders and spoke slowly, knowing how this would sound to her. "Peggy... I was sleeping in the ice for 66 years."

She stared at him for a long time, confusion in her eyes. She clearly sensed his sincerity, but how could she not doubt him? Peggy spoke carefully in a low voice. "Steve... you're scaring me."

"I was scared, too," he whispered.

"Sixty-six years..." Peggy's eyes darted around his face. "That isn't possible."

"I thought that, too. It was like... a bad nightmare, only I couldn't wake up from it."

"You _were_ dreaming," Peggy said, with the air of a woman grasping at straws. "You dreamed under the ice. The serum... People weren't meant to survive something like that. It must have affected your mind."

"No," Steve said firmly. "I lived there, in 2011. And 2012, and 2013, and..." He swallowed. "I had to. There was no way to get back to you. I had to stay. I lived there for 12 years. And I missed you... more than you can know."

Peggy wasn't bothering to hide her rising panic. "But... Steve..."

"You're holding the coin," Steve said.

She had forgotten. She held it up between shaking fingers, staring at the date, and then staring back up at him.

"How did you get this?" she demanded fiercely. "How did you get it, really?"

"The same way everyone else gets them in the future," Steve said. "I bought a soda. They gave me change."

Peggy breathed quickly. "But if you... if you slept for 66 years, you would still _be _asleep. Right now."

"I am," Steve said. "I am sleeping in the ice right now. I'm also here, because I came back to you."

He launched into an explanation of the Quantum Tunnel, trying to keep it as simple as possible. There was no need to go into the Avengers or Thanos. He'd known all along he would have to be careful about how much he told her. It was a difficult task, explaining the time theory, as there wasn't much in their shared 1930s education that could have prepared either one of them to understand these concepts, but Peggy was obviously doing her best to keep up. It was hard to tell at first if she completely believed him, though she certainly seemed to be trying to.

Finally, though, she seemed to accept his explanation, as incredible as it was.

"You do look different," she said slowly, putting her fingers under his chin and turning his face to the side, looking him over. "You do seem older..."

"Does it bother you?" he asked.

She shook her head quickly. "You're back. That's all I prayed for. Nothing else really matters, does it?"

"I've loved you at every age you've ever been," he said gently.

She smiled at him sweetly, holding eye contact for a long moment, drinking him in. Until slowly, her smile started to fade and a slow fear crept across her face.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I can't bear to think of you under the ice, all alone," she said, and the growing horror in her eyes underscored her words. "Steve... we have to go get you. We have to tell Howard where to look!"

"We can't do that," Steve said urgently. "You have to leave me right where I am. We can't tell Howard anything, or anyone else, either."

"What? _Why?_" Peggy demanded.

"Because if you take me out of the ice now, I'll never make it to the future, and that means I'll never be able to come back to you."

Peggy was growing more confused by the minute. "But you'll be _here_. I'll have saved you."

"No, Peg... if I don't end up in the future, bad things will happen. Bad things that I helped stop. We can't be selfish. We can't undo what I did in that time." He brushed a wave of dark hair back from her face. "I have so much more to tell you. Everything will make sense then, I promise." He leaned forward and kissed her again, gently touching her face with his fingertips. It turned out to be a good distraction for the both of them, and they spent the next few minutes explaining to each other again just how much they had missed each other.

Finally Peggy pulled away from him a little, looking down self-consciously. "I must look a mess." She took a handkerchief out of her sleeve and dabbed under her eyes, looking ruefully at the black smears it left behind. "I've spoiled my eye makeup, crying so much."

Steve smiled and used his thumb to rub a spot at the corner of her lips. "And I've spoiled your lipstick, kissing you so much."

Peggy laughed a little shakily. "I think that's the only reason I believe this whole crazy story. You used to be afraid to kiss me. I used to get so annoyed with you because you wouldn't make a move. I suppose you finally learned a few bloody things about women while you were gone."

"Only a few," Steve said. "You still have a lot left to teach me."

Peggy shot him a strange look, her lips curving up in a hint of a smile, and then she got up from the couch. "I'm going to freshen up. I'll be right back." She started to walk energetically up the stairs, heels clicking rapidly, and then turned back. "You won't disappear again?"

"I'm not going anywhere," he promised.

While Peggy was gone, Steve strolled over to the player and idly went through the stack of records by it, looking at the covers. It was like looking at a scrapbook of his childhood. So many bands and songs from long ago. So many memories associated with each one.

He pulled one out for a better look: Harry James and His Orchestra. There was a price tag on the corner that read $1.25. Steve shook his head, feeling cheated. He'd paid a lot more than that at the antique store for his copy, and it had been scratched, too. Then it had taken him a few weeks to find a player for it that actually worked. He pulled the record out and slid it onto the rod. He switched the player on and swung over the arm, placing the stylus in its track. Tinny music started to play, an upbeat jazz tune.

He had listened to a few songs before Peggy came back down the stairs. Steve looked up at her, and smiled deeply. She had done more than just fix her makeup. She had changed out of the black dress and into a red one.

"Wow," he said, and he meant it.

Peggy smoothed down the skirt of her dress a little nervously. "I haven't worn color in six months," she said. "My friends kept telling me that wearing mourning was going out of fashion."

"I like old fashions," Steve said. "But you look beautiful in red." He held out one hand toward her. "Come over here, Peggy. Teach me how to dance."

She looked at him in surprise. "Now?"

"If there's one thing that I've learned, it's that there's no time like the present."

Smiling, she took his hands. "All right. This hand here, and this hand here."

"Like this?"

"Yes, that's not bad." She started to sway back and forth, and he did his best to copy her. "Are you telling me that in 12 years, you really never went dancing?" Peggy asked then.

"Of course not. I was waiting for the right partner."

He immediately stepped on her foot.

"Sorry," he said hastily. "Should have chosen a slower song. Forgot about that part."

"You are heavier than you look," Peggy said, wincing, but she was laughing too. "Maybe this would go better if I let you lead now."

They managed to get through the rest of the song without incident. It really wasn't as hard as he had once feared. Of course, being with Peggy made everything easier.

A new song had started, one that Steve had listened to so many times he had it memorized.

"Lesson number two," Peggy told him. "If the person you're dancing with is your best girl, and if you think she would like it, you _are_ allowed to hold her a little closer."

"Closer than this?"

"Mmm-hmm."

"Well... if you insist."

He slid his arm further across her back and pulled her in closer. He did not step on her feet. Willingly, Peggy leaned against him, her warm forehead coming to rest against his cheek.

Together, they swayed back and forth. It was like being in their own private paradise. The music filling his soul, the feel of her in his arms, the smell of her hair... She belonged to him, and he to her.

He pulled back a little, wanting to see into her eyes. Peggy smiled at him sweetly, and slowly, gently, he kissed her again.

_Never thought that you would be  
standing here so close to me  
there's so much I feel that I should say  
but words can wait until some other day_

_Kiss me once, then kiss me twice  
Then kiss me once again  
It's been a long, long time  
Haven't felt like this, my dear_

_Since I can't remember when  
It's been a long, long time  
You'll never know how many dreams  
I've dreamed about you_

_Or just how empty they all seemed without you  
So kiss me once, then kiss me twice  
Then kiss me once again  
It's been a long, long time._

* * *

**Author's note:** The story feels like it could end here, like the movie did. But I also thought I wanted to show more of the reunion of old Steve with the Avengers, as they find out what he did with his life in the past. Do you want to read something like that, or do you feel it should end here? Please share your thoughts in the comments!


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's note: **_My apologies for making you wait so long for this update. As seems to happen to me so often, a combination of pathological perfectionism and real life getting in the way meant that writing this story ended up being more of a journey than I first anticipated! But hopefully I have risen to the challenge, and I have quite a few chapters socked away now. I certainly enjoyed writing them, and I hope you like reading them!_

* * *

**The 1940s**

Steve agreed to stay in Peggy's spare room for the time being. It wasn't exactly proper in this time for two unmarried people to be sleeping in the same house with no chaperone, which he belatedly remembered after he had already accepted Peggy's invitation. There was no question that he would stick to his best behavior, but he had long ago accepted the practice at Avengers Headquarters of everyone sleeping in bedrooms right next door to each other, and now he would have to get back into the 1940s mindset. But for now there didn't seem to be much choice, and anyway, he had more than one reason to stay out of sight of Peggy's neighbors. He could not go anywhere until he had forged his new identity and grown out his beard. The papers were still mentioning Steve Rogers' disappearance from time to time, and he didn't want to be recognized.

He smiled to himself to think how skeptical he had been all those years ago when Natasha had insisted that a beard would be enough to hide him while they were on the run, but she had been right. No one on the streets had looked twice at him during their exile. Hopefully that would hold true now, particularly since no one would be looking for him as a wanted man here. People had a tendency to see only what they expected to see, and Captain America was dead.

The next day, Peggy used her contacts at work to gather all the paperwork Steve needed, and that night he sat down at her kitchen table and began to coolly fill out his own birth certificate.

"Grant Edward Buchanan," Peggy read out loud, leaning over his shoulder to watch him write. She gave a short laugh. "Steve, do I really have to call you that?"

"The more often, the better," he answered. "So we can both get used to it." He filled in his new birth date, just a few months earlier than his real one. Of course, he was now 12 years older than that, but thankfully it didn't show much.

Peggy put her hand on the back of his neck, her fingers playing a little with his hair. "You'll always be Steve Rogers to me," she said softly.

He paused writing, and looked up at her. "Only when we're alone."

They locked eyes, and then Peggy bent down and kissed him, briefly but warmly. She pulled back and smiled at him, and then came around to sit beside him at the table.

"Are you sure you're comfortable with this?" he asked, glancing at the stack of false papers waiting to be filled out. "Helping me keep a secret this big? It isn't going to be easy."

"Steve, I work for an intelligence agency," Peggy said coolly. "My life is already full of secrets. What's one more?"

"This one... might be a little different," he said cautiously, but Peggy only shook her head.

"It's you I'm worried about," she said. "Are you sure you want to do this? Can you really be happy living this way? A life in the shadows? An ordinary life?"

He took a moment to answer.

"Peggy... I was nobody special before this happened to me," he said, gesturing meaningfully at his body. "And I never minded that. I didn't sign up for the war to get fame and glory. At the time, I'm not sure I really understood all the reasons I _was_ doing it. But I've had time now to get some perspective." He took a deep breath and let it out. "I've spent the last 15 years of my life fighting in one way or another. And in all that time, I never lived for the fight. I fought for _others_' lives. And I put off my own to do it." He looked down for a moment, and then glanced up at her. "It isn't a war I need, Peggy. It's a _purpose_. The war gave me that for a while, but it turns out that even I can get enough of fighting."

She tilted her head at him in curiosity. "And what will your purpose be now?"

He looked up at her and smiled mysteriously. "I have a few ideas about that."

* * *

Being with Peggy again after so long of a separation left Steve feeling like a desert traveler who had stumbled upon an oasis and didn't fully dare to believe it was real. There were times over the next few days that he was tempted to pinch himself, just to make sure it wasn't a dream.

His transition to modern times after waking up from the ice had been a difficult one, month after month hazed over by his grief for everything and everyone he had lost and aggravated by an extreme case of culture shock. Steve had anticipated that this transition back into the past would be easier, not least of all because he had chosen it, but also because this time he would be back in familiar surroundings, and because he would have Peggy by his side. It wasn't seamless, though. There were of course all the little things he had expected, like the loss of the modern conveniences that he had come to take for granted - he was constantly patting his pants pocket out of habit before remembering that he no longer had a cell phone to put in there, or opening his mouth to ask F.R.I.D.A.Y. a question only to stop himself just in time - but that was nothing time wouldn't heal.

The bigger problem was that once again his heart was darkened by grief. He had already been grieving for Nat and Tony, and now all the rest of his friends were gone, too. He wouldn't see them for many long years, if he lived to see them again at all. He had no regrets about what he had done, but that didn't always make the choice easy to live with. Despite his hard work to get with the times, he'd never really felt completely at home in the future, but his friends... they _were_ his home, and he missed them.

Worst of all, the horror of the final battle with Thanos had not completely faded from his mind. Only a week after his return, he was seized by a vivid dream in which he saw, all over again, the colors of the Infinity Stones washing over Tony's body as he held up his Iron Gauntlet in one final defiance of Thanos, and felt all over again the helplessness as he struggled to rise from where he had been thrown, wanting to stop what was happening, wanting to tear the gauntlet away from Tony before it was too late. But in his dream, as before, he just... couldn't... get there in time.

Tony Snapped.

With a strangled cry, Steve sat up bolt upright in bed, stretching out his hand to call Mjolnir to him. It was dark, he was confused, and it took endless seconds for him to remember where and when he really was. Gasping for breath, he dropped his hand, more than a little alarmed that for a moment, he had _felt Mjolnir move_ from across a distance so vast that his human mind could barely comprehend it. _Only a little bit_, he consoled himself, as the sweat trickled down his neck. _I only moved it a little bit._

There was a soft knock on the door, and then it opened. Peggy stood in the doorway, backlit by the hallway light, dressed in a nightgown.

"Steve?" she asked softly. "Are you all right?"

"Bad dream," he said briefly. "Sorry if I woke you up."

After a moment's hesitation, Peggy came in and sat on the edge of the bed. She put her hand on top of one of his, and he took it gratefully, glad she hadn't left right away. They sat there in silence for a while, holding hands, while Steve worked to slow his breathing back down.

"Who's Tony?" Peggy asked softly after a minute.

Steve closed his eyes for a moment. "Did I say Tony?"

"You did. You called it out."

He didn't answer right away. Peggy was destined to create S.H.I.E.L.D. She couldn't know too much, too soon. She couldn't know anything about Thanos, or the Infinity Stones, or the Avengers.

Or could she?

The Ancient One had specified what Steve couldn't do. He couldn't do anything he already knew he hadn't done. No saving Bucky. No stopping the Hydra infiltration of S.H.I.E.L.D. - or enlisting Peggy to do it. If Bruce's explanation of time travel had been correct, it was actually impossible for Steve to change things in the past, at least in his own reality. Maybe it _was_ within his power to create a branch in time and start a new alternate reality by making different choices... but if he attempted something like that, the Ancient One stood ready with the Time Stone to reset any disastrous alternate realities he might create. And he understood the reasons why. How could he know whether any changes he made would make things better? Steve had learned enough about the world now to know that decisions and events were interconnected in intricate ways, and somehow over the years everything had happened the way it needed to for Thanos to be ultimately defeated. If Steve knocked down one brick, the whole tower might fall.

He had come back home with a half-formed idea that nothing about certain topics could ever pass his lips, not even to Peggy. But in a flash he understood the reality of the situation: he couldn't keep secrets that big from his own wife. Those events had shaped him and changed him. She couldn't know who he really was unless he shared them. And he wanted nothing less than complete unity with Peggy. He hadn't come all the way back to 1945 to share only half his soul with her.

More than anything, he ached to tell her about the Avengers. If there was one thing he regretted, it was that Peggy would never meet them. They would never meet Peggy. The two circles of his life would never touch; Peggy would die before he could be reunited with the Avengers. To tell her about them would be a way of bringing them together.

But if he told her about the good things, he'd have to tell her about all the bad things interlaced with them. How do you tell the woman you love that you had to tear down the very agency she worked all her life to build? How do you tell her of her own death? How do you tell her that one day half of all life will vanish with the snap of a finger? He knew that Peggy would die before that happened, and therefore be spared the horror... and yet a chill moved down his spine as he realized that if they had children, if their children had children... the Snap was going to decimate their own family. But Peggy could be spared the knowledge of any of those things. His silence would be a way for him to protect her, although she would never know of it.

And yet...

He'd tried to spare Tony that kind of pain by withholding information, and it had backfired. If he did the same thing to Peggy, she'd still discover things in real time as events unfolded. She would take it as a betrayal if Steve never warned her of what was to come. He would tear his own family apart, just as surely as the Avengers had been torn apart.

"Steve?" Peggy prompted again. She sounded worried.

He pushed the blankets off his legs. "I'm not gonna be able to go back to sleep," he said matter-of-factly. He'd been through the insomniac routine enough times to know that.

"I'll stay up with you," she said immediately.

"You have work in the morning."

"I don't care."

Steve didn't raise any more objections. They went down to the kitchen together, and Peggy flipped on the switch, flooding the room in warm yellow light. He asked her for some paper, and for a while they sat at the table in companionable silence while Peggy watched him sketch. He glanced up at her from time to time, glad that he wasn't alone for the insomniac routine for a change. It was the first time he had seen Peggy without makeup, he realized. She looked younger, somehow, and still very pretty, with untamed curls framing her face instead of the usual perfect waves.

As he sketched, he wrestled with his thoughts. His urge to protect Peggy from pain was warring with his desire to spill out everything that had happened to him over the last 12 years right down to the smallest detail. He realized he had no idea what was the right thing to do. What, if anything, should he tell Peggy about the future... and when should he do it? There was too much to give all at once.

What would _he_ want to be told, if their positions were reversed?

Instantly, everything clicked into place. Because he understood: he wouldn't want Peggy to decide something like that on her own. Partly because he wouldn't want her to carry that kind of burden, and partly because she might not be able to correctly guess what he would or wouldn't want to know about in advance.

"Steven Rogers," Peggy said suddenly, a hint of alarm creeping into her voice. "For goodness sake, put down that pencil and tell me what you're thinking. You look like you're about to have a panic attack."

He took a deep breath and met her eyes. "I was trying to decide something, but I just realized that I don't need to. It's your choice, not mine. I'm going to give it to you."

"What do you mean?"

"I've been to the future," he told her quietly. "I know more than anyone should about what's to come. It's the price I paid for being a time traveler. I'm... cursed with knowledge." He closed his eyes for a moment, tasting for the first time the bitterness of Thanos' own words.

"I should think that would be a comfort," Peggy said slowly. "You'd never be blindsided by anything... and if something really bad was going to happen, you'd have a chance to stop it."

"That's just it," Steve said. "I _can't_. I can't change anything, because all of it has already happened."

She frowned at him, puzzled. "I don't understand."

"Here's how it was said by someone with a much bigger brain than mine," Steve said, and he couldn't help but smile a little at the memory of Bruce patiently explaining it to him in layman's terms. "No one can change the past. Now that I've traveled here, to 1945, _this_ time is becoming my future. But everything that happened to me in those years after I woke up from the ice is already past. I can't change my past from here in my future. That's impossible._"_

Peggy thought about that for a long moment. "So, the future... _my_ future... is your past."

Steve nodded. "And it's a done deal. Set in concrete." He sighed. "Both the good and the bad."

"You know _everything_ that's going to happen?" Peggy said wonderingly.

"Not everything," he said. "But... a lot. Everything I read about in the history books. Everything I experienced personally. I know the future of S.H.I.E.L.D. I know things about people that you know, and people you haven't met yet but someday will. I even know a few things about your own life, Peggy."

"Do you think I haven't thought of that?" Peggy asked softly. "You went all the way to the year 2023. I can do the math. You must know when I'm going to die."

"You see the problem," Steve said. "I don't want to keep secrets from you, Peggy. But I also don't want to tell you things you're not ready to hear. That's why I'm putting the choice in your hands."

"It can't all be bad," Peggy said after a long silence. "Or you wouldn't have come back to live through it all."

"No," he agreed, and he reached out to touch her cheek briefly, smiling at her. "Not all bad."

"I'm not sure how to handle this," Peggy said after some thought. "I don't know the things I don't know. If you ask me if I want to know whether or not the sky is going to turn green tomorrow, well, that would be a bit of a giveaway, wouldn't it?"

"You have a point," Steve admitted. "But maybe, if I asked you very general questions..."

"Rhetorical ones," Peggy said.

"Rhetorical questions," he agreed, "and maybe even worked in some red herrings here and there-"

"-so that I could never be sure whether it was something that really happened or not, unless I agree to let you tell me more-"

"I think this could work," Steve said.

"Give me an example," Peggy said.

"Okay..." Steve thought rapidly. "If I had ever been to another planet, would you want to know?"

"Steve!" Peggy burst into sudden laughter. "Really? You have to make the red herrings at least _plausible_."

"I told you two days ago that I traveled through a time machine, and you believed _that,_" he said mildly.

"Yes, but another _planet_?" Peggy laughed again, and then, catching his eye, slowly grew serious.

"Wait. _Have_ you been to another planet?" she asked in surprise.

"Do you really want me to answer that?"

"I... don't know," Peggy said confusedly. "I'm going to need some time to think about that one. Give me another."

"Okay. If I had become good friends with the son of someone you know, would you want to know?"

Peggy thought for a while. "Yes," she said.

"If I tell you, you're going to know about someone before he's born," he warned. "And you can't tell your friend about what's coming. You're sure you want to know?"

"Yes," Peggy said positively. "It's... it's been eating me up," she suddenly confessed. "Thinking about you showing up in the future like that, lost and alone... I can't bear to think about it. I want to hear about the friends you made."

"Okay." He felt a wave of relief. It was one of the things he had most wanted to tell her. He slid over the notebook he'd been sketching in so that Peggy could see.

"You asked who Tony was? That's Tony," he told her.

He'd drawn Tony wearing one of his favorite band shirts, along with a pair of much-loved rumpled jeans. His hair was gelled and spiky on top, and he was wearing his tinted sunglasses.

"Is that what all the men wear in the future?" Peggy asked, fighting back a smile so that a dimple popped out in her cheek.

Steve knew what she meant. It had once looked ridiculous to his eyes, too, not least of all the oddly shaped beard.

"Tony was very fashionable," he told her. "Everyone copied him."

"Did you?"

He smiled, despite himself. "Not really, no."

"His _hair_... he looks like he just rolled out of bed," Peggy said, and a laugh popped out before she could stop it. "I'm sorry, Steve. I know he was a friend of yours. Or... he will be, I suppose. So, whose son is he?"

"Howard Stark's."

She stared at him. "_Howard_? You can't be serious."

"I couldn't be more. Look at him. The apple didn't fall far from the tree."

Peggy leaned over and studied the sketch more closely. "I didn't think Howard would ever settle down and start a family," she said at last in amazement, looking back up at Steve. "Let's face it, he just isn't the type."

"Well, people change," Steve said. "Sometimes they surprise you. Tony... he surprised me, too."

She looked over at him, expression softening. "Tell me about him."

"Well..." Steve scratched his head. There was so much to say about Tony. Where to start? With the snark and the genius? The forward thinking and the backward ideals? His unimaginable riches and his unbearable guilt? The many good intentions gone awry, and the equally unexpected redemptions?

He wanted to convey all of that to Peggy, and then some. But for some reason, he suddenly found himself blurting out something completely different: "He taught me how to swear."

"What?" Peggy looked at him strangely. "I've heard you swear before."

"Yeah, the little ones," Steve said. "He had me saying the _big_ ones."

Peggy's eyes widened, although there was a definite undercurrent of amusement as she said in shocked tones: "Steven Rogers!"

Steve sighed heavily, but he couldn't help but smile a little, too, as he admitted sheepishly: "Tony was a really bad influence on me."

* * *

As soon as his new identity was complete and his beard had grown out, Steve got a job at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, where they were eager to hire veterans with strong arms and backs to help with the construction of new ships, and he found a cheap place nearby to live. _Too_ cheap, Peggy said when she visited, wrinkling her nose as she looked over his cramped apartment and outdated furniture, but Steve didn't care. There were important things he needed to save for; he had come home with nothing but the clothes on his back. And he knew he wouldn't be doing this for long. He'd seen the date on the marriage license. He could bear the wait.

As much as he looked forward to marrying Peggy, he surprised himself by feeling no rush to propose. Now that the war was over and the world was at peace, it felt like they had all the time in the world. And although it took more than an hour for them to take the train to see each other during the months of their courtship, they made every moment together count. They needed the time to get to know each other again. Steve had changed during his long years away, and even Peggy, who had lived only six months apart from him, still contained mysteries he had never had a chance to explore. They'd been so focused on fighting a war that he'd never had the leisure to find out much about her childhood and youth, her family and friends back home, her dreams for the future.

There were long walks and talks. Trips to the cinema and meals shared. And every Saturday night, without fail, they went out dancing.

It wasn't as good as Steve had imagined it would be. It was even better.

By the time March rolled around, everything was ready. Steve had been accepted back into Auburndale. He'd saved enough for the ring. And after a long discussion about it, he and Peggy agreed to bring her parents in on the secret — or at least part of it. They saw no need to go into the time travel, by far the strangest aspect of the whole story. But it would be relatively easy to explain that Steve Rogers had survived the plane crash and chosen to live a life of quiet anonymity once the war was over. It was the truth, after all. And so Peggy's parents flew over from England for a visit at her request, and after the explanations were finished and the amazement had subsided, Steve asked Peggy's father for his blessing.

"Captain America wants to marry my daughter," Harrison Carter said, looking at Steve in both amusement and wonder. "Did you really think you needed to ask?"

Then his smile slowly faded. "You know, my daughter chose an unusual occupation for a woman. A difficult one. There was a time when her mother and I thought she could be dissuaded from it, at least once the war was over, but as you can see..." He gestured a little helplessly. "Well, she's a very determined young lady. I suppose you've figured that out by now. I don't think she's planning on giving it up, Captain."

"I don't want her to," Steve said. "I want her to do what she feels called to do."

"But she wants a family, too," Mr. Carter objected.

"So do I."

Mr. Carter looked at him a little skeptically. "How are you planning to make that work?"

"However we have to," Steve said matter-of-factly. Mr. Carter still didn't look satisfied, so he clarified. "I'm going to make Peggy happy. Whatever it takes. If that means I handle things at home while she goes to work, then so be it."

"You're really going to do it, aren't you?" Mr. Carter said a little wonderingly. "Retire. From all of it. You were on top of the world, and you're going to walk away, just like that?"

"I never wanted to be a professional soldier," Steve pointed out. "I did what I did because that's where I was needed. Now, I'm needed for something else." He paused, and then asked directly: "Do you think that's a waste of what I was given?"

Mr. Carter was silent for a long time. Then he said with a hint of gruffness coloring his British accent: "You know, from the moment my children were born, I've been... far prouder of them than anything I ever did at my company. And when we lost our son in the war-" He sighed quietly, and shifted his hat around in his hands for a few moments as he worked to maintain his composure. Finally, he cleared his throat roughly. "There's nothing like losing a child to remind you of what really matters. I would have given up my whole career if it could have brought Michael back to us."

"I'm so sorry," Steve said gently.

Mr. Carter nodded in quiet acknowledgement. "You're right," he said to Steve. "You're right. I wouldn't have called it a waste if Peggy had given up _her_ work for a family, even with all her gifts. I suppose it's no different the other way around, is it?"

Steve blinked a little, pleasantly surprised. He hadn't been at all sure that Peggy's parents would understand; what he was proposing was not often done in this time period. But Peggy must have inherited her good sense and practicality from somewhere, he realized.

"Of course, you know I'm just being selfish," Mr. Carter said with a touch of wry humor. "Amanda's been longing for grandchildren since the moment our own birds flew the nest. I won't have any peace in the house until she gets what she wants. Consider yourself enlisted in the cause."

"I'll... do my best," Steve said, suppressing the urge to squirm uncomfortably, but he would not have offended his father-in-law for the world.

Mr. Carter caught his eye, and suddenly Steve realized his expression was plainly teasing. Mr. Carter was definitely enjoying his discomfort. Well, Peggy _had_ warned him about that. Apparently her late brother, too, had had a streak of mischief and merriment in him. Steve was sorry he had never been able to meet Michael. He was about to get a father for the first time in his life, and regain a mother. It would have been nice to find out what it was like to have a brother, too.

"There's just one other thing," Mr. Carter said, suddenly growing serious. "With Peggy's work... well, she can't talk about everything that she does. But I have a feeling some of it is dangerous. Her mother and I, we worry a lot. You don't know how many times we wished that she didn't live alone like this. That she had someone we could trust, right there beside her, to protect her." He looked directly into Steve's eyes. "I don't want to outlive both of my children. Can you promise me that nothing will happen to my daughter?"

"She'll be safe with me," Steve promised without hesitation, regretting only that he couldn't tell Mr. Carter just how certain he was that Peggy would live a long and happy life.

* * *

It couldn't be the large wedding Mrs. Carter had once envisioned for her daughter, but she grudgingly accepted that fact after a few days, once Peggy had agreed to let her spend what seemed an outrageous sum for the wedding dress. Peggy surprised Steve by producing his original Army dress uniform out of her closet - apparently she had collected his effects after his disappearance, since he had no next of kin to send them to - and that was nearly all the preparation they needed to make. They planned to honeymoon right there in Peggy's little home. Someday he intended to take Peggy back to Europe to see all the places they had helped liberate, but for now a luxurious vacation was the last thing on their minds. The only thing they cared about was each other.

They were married a few days later at Holy Cross in Brooklyn - the same church where both his parents had been laid to rest in the churchyard outside - with only Peggy's parents and their understanding priest in attendance. Steve signed the paperwork as Grant Edward Buchanan, as he must, but he used his real name for the ceremony. He trusted his priest, who had been hearing his confessions since he was a boy and had faithfully promised his discretion about the situation. Steve was determined that despite his false identity, the marriage at least would be real in every possible sense.

Afterwards the four of them went to a nice restaurant for a wedding supper they were all too emotional to enjoy properly, and straight afterward Steve drove the Carters to the airport to catch their flight back to England. After more than a few tears on Mrs. Carter's part, he and Peggy said goodbye and got into the car, just the two of them, and went home. Not to her home or his home... to their home.

Steve went to bed that night, but he never went to sleep. Insomnia had chased him for so many years after he had been rescued from the ice: fueled by anxieties, by memories of bloody battles, by loss and grief. But this was the first time he laid awake all night with a smile spread across his face, his eyes filled with Peggy's beautiful sleeping face, his arms filled with her warm pliant body. The nightmare was over.

* * *

After the wedding, Peggy busied herself with her work at the newly-established S.H.I.E.L.D. offices at Camp Lehigh, and Steve quit his job at the shipyard to focus on his classes at Auburndale. In the meantime he found odd jobs here and there, creating illustrations for advertisements, for books, and best of all, for a comic book publishing company based in New York. He started at the bottom of the totem pole there, only sketching in backgrounds for the panels created by more experienced artists. But he learned a lot by watching, and an idea started to grow in his mind, an idea that excited him and filled him with a sense of the purpose he had been looking for.

The story of the Avengers had never been told. Not the real story. Innumerable words had been spilled about them in news reports and analyses, in criticisms and hagiographies, in gossip and rumors. Half of what the world thought they knew about the Avengers had been shaped by politicians, or by their enemies, or by people who had never even met them. Most of the Avengers had been uninterested or too occupied with more important matters to even attempt to shape their own public image. Only Tony had ever sought out the spotlight, with mixed results.

This was Steve's chance. He had all the time in the world to do it. His memories of the Avenger years were as fresh as the day they had happened, thanks to the improved memory the serum had granted him. And now that he was honing his artistic abilities, soon he would be able to do them justice. He knew comic books weren't exactly taken seriously as adult entertainment, at least not in this time, but somehow it seemed the most natural thing in the world to tell the Avengers' story that way. After all, it was how Captain America had been introduced to the world. Except this creation wouldn't be wartime propaganda, but the truth.

Of course, he wouldn't be able to publish anything he created; not yet, anyway. But by the time he aged back into the future, he could have everything ready to go. After the reversal of the Snap, there would be a hunger in the public to know what had happened, and why. He would be able to show the Avengers as they really were. If he could clear up even one misunderstanding, if he could persuade even some of the powers that be that they didn't need to fear Wanda and the others... it would be worth it.

It was an ambitious project, he knew, and it was going to take a long time to come to fruition. Years, at least. Maybe his whole life. That just meant that the sooner he started, the better.

"You really are the Star-Spangled Man with a plan," Peggy teased him the first day she came home to find him with a spread of rough sketches covering the desk: the outlines of the first phase of his project. She came up behind him, wrapped her arms around his chest and gave him a squeeze and a kiss on the cheek. Then she leaned over his shoulder and picked up one of the sketches. "Who is this?" she asked curiously.

"That's Thor," he said distractedly, not looking up from what he was doing.

Peggy knew a little about all of the original Avengers by now, and his first meeting with them. So far their arrangement had worked out well. She wanted to know as much as possible about everyone he had befriended. She wanted to know nothing of her own life or death, but she had chosen to be given a month's warning before the death of anyone close to her. She had also chosen not to know specifics about the future of S.H.I.E.L.D., although she had reserved the right to change her mind later. That meant that for now, she knew nothing of Hydra and the Winter Soldier... or of Hank Pym, for that matter, since she would one day be instrumental in mentoring him.

Even though it was Peggy's choice, Steve wondered sometimes whether he should encourage her to accept more information sooner. But there was plenty of time... and he remembered, too, what Thor had told him only a few days before he had left Earth with the Guardians of the Galaxy: that his mother had flatly refused to hear anything about her future, even though it must have been clear to her, from Thor's emotional state, that trouble was looming on the horizon. If the queen of Asgard was wise enough to refrain from too much foreknowledge, then maybe Peggy was wise to do the same.

"It's funny to think that Johann Schmidt was right after all," Peggy said thoughtfully, studying the sketch of Thor. "All his obsessions over Teutonic myth, thinking that the old gods were real? And here he is, large as life: the God of Thunder himself."

"There's only one..." Steve paused for a moment and then grinned. "You're right, Thor _is_ a god. He's dressed like one, isn't he?"

Peggy studied the sketch again, tilting her head to the side. "He certainly has the _muscles_ of a god."

Steve glanced up at her, and then did a double-take.

"Hey!" he said indignantly, snatching the paper out of her hands.

"Your muscles are very nice too, darling," Peggy said quickly.

"Don't look at his muscles," Steve said, putting Thor's sketch underneath several sheets of paper.

She laughed at him. "You're the one who drew him that way!"

"That's how he looks!" Steve defended himself. "Well... usually."

"Don't be jealous. You know there's only one man I would ever fondue with," Peggy comforted him, and then she deliberately swiveled his chair to the side and parked herself in his lap, putting her arms around his neck and smiling sweetly at him.

"I can't work like this," Steve pointed out with a small smile.

"Good," Peggy whispered, and kissed him on the lips. Willingly Steve wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed her back.

Peggy settled herself in more comfortably on his lap, crossing her legs and smoothing out her skirt, showing a distracting amount of skin. Well, pantyhose, anyway. And she was wearing those red heels that he liked. Suddenly Steve felt himself losing interest in sketching anything more tonight. He'd pick it up again in the morning. That was all right, he could afford to take a break every once in a while.

Of course, he ended up taking an awful lot of "breaks" when Peggy came home from work in the evenings, which inevitably led directly to the biggest wrench thrown into his ambitious plan that he could have imagined: the day Peggy told him she was expecting.

Suddenly, nothing else seemed to matter. There were doctors to see, things to buy, changes to make to the house. One moment Peggy was practically glowing with happiness and health, and the next she came home from work feeling sick or achey or exhausted. Steve found himself doing more and more, both to care for her and for the house. In the meantime, he and Peggy played a delightful ongoing game in which she pretended to beg him to tell her whether the baby would be a boy or a girl, and he pretended to refuse to tell her. She didn't really want to know, of course, and he couldn't blame her. It was bad enough that he knew so much about what was to come; Peggy should have the pleasure of being surprised, if he couldn't.

He thought often of the photo he'd seen of Peggy with a son and a daughter... and the boy had definitely been the taller one. He tried not to be smug about the fact that he knew this baby would be a boy, but it was hard to keep a straight face when Peggy tried to coax information out of him.

But finally, the day came when she was taken into the maternity ward and he was forced to wait out in the hallway along with the other prospective fathers. It was ironic. Living in the future, he'd often been disappointed by the changes time had wrought, and the loss of traditions from his own time. Now that he was back in the '40s, he often found himself thinking with regret of the things from the future that had been an improvement. Like the policy of letting fathers into the delivery room. But if there was one thing he knew how to do, it was how to roll with the times, and so he paced the hallway impatiently until finally the nurses came to get him and told him he could go in now.

Smiling broadly, eager to see his son in person at last, Steve strode into the room. Peggy was lying back on the bed, looking tired but happy. Steve's eyes went down to the blanket-wrapped bundle she was holding.

To the blanket-wrapped _bundles_ she was holding.

He froze, several steps away from the bed. Why was Peggy holding two babies?

"You with your smug smiles," Peggy said to him a little tartly. "I asked you _so_ many times if it was going to be a boy or a girl, and you never once let on for a moment that it was to be one of each!"

Steve stared at her, stunned. "Are both of those _ours_?" he blurted out, louder than he meant to.

"Yes, as you very well know," Peggy said indignantly. "Oh, don't play ignorant now, Steve, it's much too late for that." She glanced down at the babies and a dimpled smile lit up her face. "And they're just perfect, aren't they? Two perfect little darlings. One of each." She looked up at Steve, accusing again. "We're going to have to go buy another bassinet, do you realize that? And twice as many clothes. Why didn't you just tell me in the first place? Ridiculous man."

Steve opened his mouth and then closed it again, completely speechless. He reached up to put an astonished hand on his head.

"Twins?" he finally managed to wheeze.

Peggy looked at him with suddenly narrowed eyes. "You mean you really _didn't_ know?"

"No!" he said vehemently. "The boy was _taller_, in the photograph I saw. I thought... I thought..."

Peggy started to laugh. She winced with the pain, but she kept on laughing.

"Your face!" she said breathlessly. "Oh, I wish you could see your face!"

She laughed at him over that one for the rest of their lives.

**TO BE CONTINUED**


	7. Chapter 7

**The 1950s**

The next few years that followed were happy, busy years, in which their lives revolved around the twins. They named the girl Sarah, after Steve's mother, and they named the boy Michael, after Peggy's late brother. Mikey had Peggy's dark hair and eyes, while Sarah was blond and blue-eyed. They grew up strong and healthy, learning to walk and talk early, rarely getting sick. Still, caring for them was a more-than-full-time task, and Steve had his hands full just keeping them fed, rested, clean and happy during the day. The neighbors thought they were strange — there were very few women who were the breadwinners while the husband stayed home with the children — but it worked for their family, and that was all that mattered.

The best times were the evenings and the weekends, when Peggy came home and they would take little Mikey and Sarah to the park or the swimming pool or for walks in the neighborhood, where both Peggy and Steve beamed with pride every time someone stopped them to exclaim over the twins, which was often - and yet they never got tired of it. They also frequently made themselves into fools trying to coax new words or smiles or laughs out of the babies.

Despite the difficult work of caring for twins, those early years were precious to Steve, and he made the most of them. He bought a camera and took copious pictures and created innumerable sketches of his family doing all the little tasks of daily life that suddenly seemed profound rather than mundane. There were endless hours spent on the floor playing with them, and there were countless nights when he and Peggy each rocked a baby in the stillness of the nursery and felt the warmth of their bodies and their slow breathing as they drifted off to sleep. Not a day went by that Steve didn't look at his children's faces and feel a profound gratitude that he'd been blessed with them. It was strange now to think of all the years he had spent as a single man; his little family of four seemed to be as large as a world, filling up his past, present and future.

Peggy now had her hands in a number of important operations at S.H.I.E.L.D. Steve quickly learned to give his advice when she asked for it, and to bite his tongue when she did not. It was clear from her steadily increasing security level that she was doing well with the responsibilities she was being given. Every now and then she would leave on trips for days at a time, sometimes on undercover assignments meeting with other intelligence operatives or military scientists, and sometimes on diplomatic trips where she met quietly with ambassadors and politicians, not only from their own two countries but from others as well. Most of the world knew nothing of S.H.I.E.L.D. yet, and that was the way S.H.I.E.L.D. preferred it.

When the twins were 3, Peggy went on her longest overseas trip yet. Steve missed her terribly while she was gone, although he didn't allow himself to complain, not even to himself, much less to her when she called long-distance to check in with him. What Peggy was doing was important, and he couldn't begrudge her for it. After all, no one could have everything, and he knew with more certainty than most people exactly how fortunate he was to have what he did have.

One night, Steve was pulled out of the thick fog of sleep to the awareness that Mikey's sleeping little body was slipping out of his arms. Startled, he instinctively grabbed on tighter, but then he felt a soft hand touch his arm, and he knew it was Peggy standing there in their darkened bedroom. He hadn't expected her back for days, and in confusion he blinked up at her shadowy shape silhouetted against the hall light. She bent down and picked up Mikey carefully, being sure not to wake him as she cradled his heavy drooping body against her chest, and carried him across the hall into the twins' bedroom. Steve roused himself and carefully picked up Sarah, who had been sleeping on the other side of him curled up against his back, and carried her across the hall, too.

Once they had tucked the children into their beds, they tiptoed back into their own bedroom and quietly shut the door.

"Back so soon?" Steve asked softly, and he reached out to switch on a bedside lamp, flooding the room with warm light. He glanced over at Peggy and froze in surprise.

"Don't overreact," Peggy said quickly, seeing his expression. "It's only a black eye."

"I thought this was a diplomatic mission," Steve after a short pause, doing his best to obey her request and almost, but not quite, succeeding.

"Yes, that's what I thought as well," Peggy said wearily. "Apparently a third party had a different idea." It was a big, dark bruise, spreading all the way around her eye, and it looked awful. Steve thought he'd been prepared for that - hadn't he already seen her in combat by his side during the war, and didn't he already know she could handle it? - but it turned out that seeing his wife and the mother of his children injured was something else entirely.

"Can I get you some ice?" he asked, careful to keep his voice level.

"I've _been_ icing it," Peggy said, sitting down on their bed and taking off her shoes with a sigh. "There's really nothing to do but wait for it to heal."

He sat down next to her and put his arm around her shoulders, and she leaned over and kissed him firmly. "I missed you," she said with feeling. "Did the kids do all right?"

"I missed you, too. The kids are fine." He carefully brushed her hair away from the bruised eye, trying not to grimace with empathetic pain. "Then your mission-"

"It was going very well, until it wasn't."

"I'm sorry. I know you worked a long time on it."

Peggy explained to him what had happened, and when she was finished, she sighed heavily.

"And you don't know who was behind the attack?" Steve asked.

"Not yet," Peggy said. "Walden is assigning me a team so I can look into it." She looked uneasy. "It's probably the Ten Rings. There were indications in that direction. But there's a part of me that fears it may have been Arnim Zola. I've been as careful as I know how, but if he's realized how closely I've been watching him, or the things I've been doing to hamstring him..."

A few years into their marriage, Peggy had asked Steve for more information on S.H.I.E.L.D.'s future, spurred by some strange and disturbing things she had noticed happening in the margins of several of the agency's operations. After a little cautious testing of the waters, he'd ended up telling her everything about Hydra's infiltration led by Zola. She'd been understandably upset, not least of all to find out what was going to happen to Bucky, and it had taken a while before she accepted the simple fact that Bucky himself had asked Steve not to try to undo his past. As much pain as Bucky had endured, he knew as well as anyone that they couldn't do anything to endanger the timeline in which Thanos had been defeated. He had even told Steve quietly, their last day together, that it was a relief that his suffering had gained a new purpose in that way.

"I doubt Zola knows what you're doing, but even if he does, it's to his benefit to leave you alone," Steve told Peggy with certainty. "Secrecy is more important to him than it is to you. If he tips his hand to anyone at S.H.I.E.L.D. by doing something as dramatic as getting rid of an agent, he loses everything. You're forcing him to be more careful about his recruiting. You're slowing him down. That's all you can do right now, but that's plenty."

"Contain the threat, but don't kill it," Peggy repeated their mantra. "Maintain the status quo. The parasite isn't strong enough to destroy the host yet."

They both knew how crucial it was to allow Operation Paperclip to move forward. For one thing, it was far better for Zola and the other German scientists to be working under S.H.I.E.L.D.'s supervision than drive them out into the world, where they could do all kinds of mischief without those prying eyes. For another, the information Zola's computerized brain would provide to Steve and Natasha in the future was absolutely essential, as devastating as his revelations had been to them at the time. In the end, all would be well: Project Insight would be stopped before the slaughter began. Peggy and Steve just had to have faith that the scenario would play out as it should. As it already _had_.

But most importantly, the two of them had realized together that while Steve already knew that Hydra's takeover of S.H.I.E.L.D. would eventually succeed, the one thing he didn't know was whether Zola had encountered a quiet resistance to his activities in the early years. And so they had taken a risk and given it a try. So far, no one else seemed to be aware of Peggy's "extracurricular" activities, although it had been a challenge to hide what she was doing not only from Arnim Zola's people, but from her own supervisors as well.

"With Zola... it's hard to know whether I'm doing too much, or not enough," Peggy murmured. "It's such delicate work."

"That's why it requires a woman's touch," Steve said.

Peggy smiled a little, but then sighed again, and laid her head on his shoulder, looking discouraged. Steve understood why. While Peggy was capable in a physical fight, it had never been her first choice for resolving a conflict. She much preferred finding diplomatic or scientific solutions, and whenever that failed she tended to take it personally.

"I wish I could help you," Steve said.

"You _are_ helping, darling," Peggy answered without hesitation, lifting her head up and speaking emphatically. "You don't know what a comfort it is to me to know that you're here, that the children are cared for and safe, even if - God forbid - my work should ever follow me home.

"But it's more than that," she added more softly. "You are my support. You're the only one I can trust to tell everything to, even if I just need to vent. And even when I just need to be held."

"That's the easy part," he said, giving her a little squeeze.

Peggy smiled a little sadly. "Just because it's easy doesn't mean it isn't important. You and the children, you help me remember what I'm doing all this for. You help me remember what's really important. Sometimes-" She trailed off. "This isn't exactly an easy job," she admitted at last. "The nature of this work... sometimes it's hard for us to keep our moral compasses straight, so to speak." She rested her forehead against his and dropped her voice to a whisper. "But you, Steve Rogers, you keep me on the path. You keep me sane. I could never do all this without you."

"I bet you could," he said loyally, even as he gave her a kiss to thank her for her kind words.

She kissed him back with feeling. "Let's hope we never have to find out."

"Still... sometimes I wish I could go with you."

"No you don't," Peggy said quietly but confidently. "Your heart is here."

"No, I don't," Steve admitted. "I don't miss the fighting, but I do wish I could protect you." He'd toyed with the idea many times - if he could only disguise himself somehow, and act as Peggy's bodyguard for the more dangerous missions - but his abilities were so notable that even with his face covered he would give away the game. In the end the attention he would draw would make Peggy more of a target, not less. Diplomacy and covert operations suited her needs better.

"You _do_ protect me," Peggy said firmly. "Where do you think I learned the skills I used on this mission that let me be the one to walk away after the fight?"

"Mary from MI6," Steve said promptly.

Peggy smiled slightly. "Well, yes, of course. She gave me a good start before I came to the SSR. But I used some of Natasha's moves that you taught me, too." Her eyes went a little distant. "Do you know, I think she might have saved my life on this mission. You and her both."

"Saving people is what Avengers do best," Steve said, trying to keep his tone light although his heart had just been seized by an odd mixture of pride in Nat and grief that he'd never be able to thank her for what she'd done for Peggy, however indirectly.

Peggy took a deep breath, looking as unnerved as he suddenly felt. "Talk to me about something more pleasant," she said quickly. "I need a good dose of normality."

"There's nothing normal about the night I just had with the kids," Steve said flatly.

"Yes, I was going to ask you," Peggy said curiously. "Why are there piles of wet towels heaped all over the house, and why on earth were the children asleep in our bed dressed in nothing but their underthings?"

"I just want you to know," Steve said after a carefully considered pause, "that at one point today I had everything under control."

"Oh, this is going to be good," Peggy said, sitting up a little straighter in anticipation.

"This afternoon Tom asked me if he could leave Bobby with me while he got some things done around the house."

Peggy exhaled loudly. "Again? Steve, at this point you are practically raising that boy for him."

"Well, I feel bad for him," Steve said a little defensively. "Unlike me, he doesn't have a wife coming home at the end of the day to help out. And if I don't help him, he's going to bring that awful woman back to keep house for him, and that's the last thing he and Bobby need."

"Yes," Peggy admitted reluctantly, "but honestly, Steve, you have your hands full enough with our own."

"There isn't that big a difference between two toddlers and three," Steve pointed out. "Actually, I think it might be easier with three. The twins don't get so bored when Bobby's over. Anyway, they all played together pretty well, once I hid that stupid jack-in-the-box they're always fighting over, and I even managed to get dinner made in the meantime."

"Mmmm, I had some of the leftovers before I came upstairs," Peggy said. "It was really good. What do you call it?"

"Croque monsieur. From that French cookbook I bought last month." He had remembered hearing good things about a cookbook by Julia Childs and had gone looking for it shortly after their marriage, but sadly it didn't seem to exist yet.

"French cookbook-!" Peggy said, laughing suddenly but choking it back so she wouldn't wake Mikey and Sarah across the hall. "Steve, you make the cooking ten times harder than you need to. If casseroles and boiled vegetables were good enough for my mother and yours..."

"Darling, I wish I could still eat that way, I really do," Steve said. "But I can't do canned meat and gelatin and boiled food anymore. My palate got permanently ruined by the 21st century."

"Yes, with eating all that gourmet food cooked by the servants Tony Stark hired in that fancy mansion you called headquarters-"

"It wasn't just that," Steve objected. "Even the _normal_ food was better. Even the food carts in the city. Everything was fresher. They could ship almost any food from anywhere in the world, anytime of the year, and they put more spices in everything. And there was no war rationing, even the poor people ate like kings, and-"

Peggy had to cover her mouth to muffle a giggle. "You are adorable when you rave about the future," she said.

"Well, I'm glad _you_ enjoy it," Steve said a little crossly, sensing that he was being mocked, but it was good to hear Peggy laugh. "Everyone in the future rolled their eyes anytime I tried to tell them about the good old days."

"Poor Steve," Peggy said sympathetically. "Always out of step, no matter when you are."

"It seems to be my fate," he said in resignation. "Anyway. Where was I?"

"Explaining the mess in the house."

"Right. So we had dinner, and I washed the dishes, and then there was still some time left before bedtime, so I thought I'd go above and beyond and make a treat for the kids." He sighed. "In hindsight, maybe I got a little too ambitious."

"Those cookies on the counter? I had one of those before I came upstairs, too," Peggy admitted. "Actually, I think you've about got the hang of it now."

"It's like my mother always said. You work hard enough, you can learn anything." Steve scratched his head. "So I gave all the kids a cookie, and I packed some up for Tom and took Bobby back over to his house. I figured I'd only be gone a minute, so I just left the twins playing in the living room while I ran across the street."

"Oh, no," Peggy said.

"Oh, yes," Steve said. "Of course, it wasn't just a minute, because Tom had to tell me a long story about his leaky pipes, and I didn't have the heart to cut him off. By the time I got away and got back home to the kids..." He trailed off.

"What did they do?" Peggy asked with some trepidation.

"One of our dear, sweet, beautiful children - and I don't know which one, because if I did, the culprit would still be standing in the corner with their nose to the wall, and probably dosed with cod-liver oil for good measure - got their grubby little hands on the big flour canister sitting on the kitchen counter, and knocked it onto the floor."

Peggy put a hand over her mouth.

"And when it hit the floor," Steve said grimly, "five pounds of flour exploded up into the air and coated every single surface in the kitchen with an inch of flour, like some kind of freak blizzard struck inside of the house."

"Oh, Steve!"

"I was gone for _five minutes_," he emphasized, "and I come back in to find them both sitting in the middle of it all, white as ghosts, swirling their hands around in it like they're finger painting. No, that's fine, go ahead and laugh. I think in a few more years I might find it funny, too."

"What did you _do_?" Peggy gasped, struggling to wipe the smile off her face.

"Only thing I could do," Steve said. "I picked them both up, one under each arm, and hauled them upstairs and put them straight into the bathtub, clothes and all."

"Better you than me," Peggy said with feeling. "I can't hardly pick them both up at the same time anymore. I think their bones are made out of cement, like yours."

"And their clothes were full of flour," Steve continued, "so we left a trail of it all the way up the stairs and down the hall and into the bathroom. It took me forever to rinse it off their skin and out of their hair - I had to change the water twice - so then I just put clean underthings on them and parked them on our bed and made them stay there while I went downstairs and cleaned up the whole mess."

"It must have taken so long," Peggy said sympathetically.

"The little monsters kept trying to come down the stairs, but I wasn't about to let them get floured all over again, so finally I bribed them to stay up there by letting them eat cookies on our bed."

"That explains the crumbs in the sheets." She made a futile effort to flick them onto the floor.

"By the time I got the kitchen and the floors all clean and came back up here, they'd fallen asleep on our bed, looking like the little angels they're not-"

"Oh Steve!"

"-and I was grumpy and I didn't want to move them and wake them up all over again, so I just washed all the flour off myself and then laid down next to them and went to sleep."

"And you still don't know which one started it all?"

Steve lifted his hands helplessly. "Well, when I caught them, Mikey was the one with a huge grin on his face and that little mischievous glint in his eyes..."

"He always looks like that," Peggy said. "He's pure Carter."

"I know. And Sarah had more flour on her, but I don't know if that means she was the one standing at ground zero when the thing came down, or if Mikey was throwing flour at her. I kept asking her, but she just looked up at me so seriously from under those eyebrows and wouldn't say much."

"She always does that."

"I _know_."

"She might have my face, but she has all your expressions," Peggy said. "All your personality."

"Don't pin this on me," Steve said. "For the next three days they're both _your_ children."

* * *

With all the demands on his time, Steve didn't make much headway on his Avengers project until the twins started school, and even then it was slow going. He didn't mind; it could wait. Their children would only be small once. In the meantime, he settled for telling them bedtime stories about some of the events he was planning to illustrate. It was good practice for him, learning which parts of the stories confused or bored them, and which got the most interest. Mikey always wanted to hear about the hand fights, stopping the narrative to beg for a blow by blow description right down to the smallest detail. Sarah, on the other hand, could not get enough of hearing about Asgardian magic and the Masters of the Mystic Arts.

Steve found that he loved the '50s every bit as much as he had always suspected he would. The music appealed to him; he had discovered Buddy Holly's recordings on Clint Barton's recommendation back when he worked for S.H.I.E.L.D., and it never failed to put a smile on his face when he turned on the car radio and heard those old songs... which weren't old songs at all now, but _new_ ones. He always got a good reaction out of Peggy when he'd blast "Peggy Sue" and sing along with it as they drove along in their station wagon, the kids complaining loudly from the back seat.

Dwight D. Eisenhower became president, which couldn't have made Steve prouder. He had never forgotten the speech General Eisenhower had given to the troops on the eve of D-Day... a speech he had often unconsciously modeled each time he felt he needed to give his own team members a pep talk prior to the mission.

He made friends with many of their neighbors and the people they attended church with, and could now answer to "Grant" as easily as he once had his real name. Sometimes, though, he lowered his guard enough talking to his friends that he slipped up and made references to movies or music that hadn't been created yet. He learned to recognize the blank looks he got, and to find ways to cover his confusing comments. It gave him a kind of secret delight to finally be the one who understood the references that others did not.

The twins grew up quickly. They had their First Communion, and they did well in school, making friends and discovering their own interests and talents. Sarah was a tender-hearted girl who kept the peace among her circle of friends with all the skill of a seasoned diplomat. Michael fell in love with baseball, and the whole family went to as many Dodgers games as they could, as Steve knew there were only a few more years left before the team would move to Los Angeles.

Sometimes Steve surprised himself with the ease in which he settled into a lifestyle so markedly different from the one he had lived in the future. Time moved differently now; there were weeks or months at a time when nothing really seemed to happen - nothing that would merit a mention in any history book, anyway - and yet every day was full from beginning to end: a happy blur of driving Sarah to her gymnastics lessons after school, and coaching Mike's Little League games, and the whole family gathering in the living room after dinner to laugh over "I Love Lucy"... and every night he drifted off to sleep with the sound of Peggy's soft breathing beside him.

From time to time, watching his children grow up at what seemed like an alarming rate, Steve would feel a stab of regret. Nothing ever stayed the same. Each time he got used to things as they were, they changed. But he had the comfort of knowing that this time, he would change with the times. He finally had... the time.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

Author's note: Let me know what you think! I love getting reviews, it helps me see if I'm on the right track!


	8. Chapter 8

_**Author's note:** I'd like to thank everyone who has recently left a review: LaneFlames2014, Guest, dissatisfieduser, TortoisetheStoryteller, GreeKnight, ColdOnePaul, Aryaan, Lattelady, browneyedgenius, SpeedReader, Sophia the Scribe and Cepheus Noir. Your feedback is both encouraging and helpful!_

_Also, I have begun posting another story called "Waking Up" that takes place after Steve Rogers wakes up from the ice and before the events of "The Avengers." It fits like a puzzle piece to this story and includes appearances from his family, so if you like this one, you may want to give it a try._

**1959**

As the twins grew older, they began making yearly visits to England, so Sarah and Mikey could get to know their grandparents and their cousins. Peggy's brother Michael had left behind a wife and an infant daughter after his death, and now his widow had remarried and had more children, including a son named Richard - Sharon's future father. Of course, that branch of Peggy's family didn't know the truth of his identity, and it would have to stay that way. He and Peggy had agreed not to tell even their own children just yet.

At first they waited because they felt it was too much to expect young children to remember not to tell their friends that their father was a famous war hero... who was supposed to be dead. Or to leave Sarah and Mikey feeling that they had some impossible standard to live up to. It was better to leave them free to enjoy a normal childhood.

And yet they knew all about Steve Rogers. Peggy saw to that, often telling the children of their friendship that had developed when he was selected as the Project Rebirth candidate, letting them read the letters Steve had exchanged with her during the months he spent performing across the country as Captain America, and showing them the old newsreels of his service in the war. They also had the collection of Captain America comics - not the ones the propagandists had created about him during the war, but Steve's own creations. By now he had illustrated not only the true events of the first phase of his life in World War II, but some of the adventures he'd had with the Avengers too.

Peggy and Steve knew from the beginning that it was a question of when, not if, they would tell the children the whole story, since it wasn't only Steve's secret, it was Mikey and Sarah's too. Dr. Erskine had made it clear that the procedure would change every cell in Steve's body… which meant any children he had would benefit from at least some of the enhancements. To what degree, it wasn't immediately clear. The twins were healthy from birth and sturdily built, not much resembling Steve's childhood physique that had so often spurred doctors, neighbors and strangers to pronounce on him the humiliating judgement: "he's delicate." But there also weren't any obvious distinctions between the twins and the neighborhood children they ran around with all day, riding their bikes and skipping rope and playing ball.

At least not at first. But as they approached adolescence - about the time Sarah stopped letting Peggy put her blond hair into pigtails, and Mikey matter-of-factly informed them that he would no longer answer to anything but "Mike" - that started to change.

Sarah threw herself into her gymnastics lessons, and almost overnight it seemed, she became so strong, flexible and graceful that they found themselves in the odd position of hoping she didn't perform too well, so as to draw too much attention to herself. They eventually realized their worry for her was misplaced. She took great joy in performing and continually improving herself, but she was far more interested in supporting the other girls than showing off in front of them. There was a gentleness in her personality that had been there since she was small. She had made up her mind at a young age to become a nurse or a doctor, and Steve and Peggy couldn't think of an occupation that would suit her personality better.

But it was worse for Mike. He loved playing — and winning — sports of all kinds, especially the rough-and-tumble ones. Unlike the other parents, Steve and Peggy didn't fear that he might get hurt... but that he might hurt others. That he might fail to respect his own power, which seemed to be growing disproportionate to the other boys'.

One day Mike went out to the backyard to play in the treehouse with his friend Bobby after school. The boys had hardly been out there ten minutes before Steve heard a terrific crash, and one of the boy shouted something at the top of his lungs. They were always shouting when they played, but this time it sounded different, and some instinct spurred Steve to go to the window.

At a glance, he saw that there was a gaping hole in one wall of the treehouse, with Bobby's scared face peeking out. The railing that encircled the structure had been snapped, too… and there was Mike, lying flat on his back on the ground far below, surrounded by splintered wood. Steve felt his heart stop.

He bolted outside and was by Mike's side in three strides, leaning over to see if he was conscious. Mike's eyes were open, but he just laid there looking stunned. Only moments later Sarah came running over from the front yard where she had been playing with one of her friends and knelt by his other side.

"Mikey!" she cried, her face pale.

Bobby had scrambled down the ladder and dashed over, panting for breath. "Are you okay?" he gasped to Mike. "Are you-?"

Blinking rapidly, Mike grimaced and began to slowly sit up.

"No, don't try to get up," Steve said quickly, but it was too late; with a drawn-out groan Mike pushed himself up into a sitting position and gingerly reached back to rub the back of his head.

"Did you hit your head?" Steve asked breathlessly. "Don't move, son. Don't move. Just... let me check." He carefully felt all over Mike's head, but he didn't find any wound. He slid his hand down and gently felt the bones of his neck, his back, his ribs. But nothing felt amiss, and Mike made no sharp cries of pain.

"How many fingers?" Steve asked, holding them up.

"Three," Mike said.

"What's your full name?"

"Michael Steven Carter."

"Dizzy at all? Feel sick?"

"No." Mike took a deep, shaky breath and pulled away from Steve's touch then, getting back onto his feet and brushing the splinters from his clothing. Incredibly, he looked steady on his feet, no longer even grimacing in pain.

"I'm okay," he said in a normal voice, looking embarrassed at all the attention focused on him. Sarah's friend Jenny, hovering several steps back, was quietly crying, while Sarah herself had impulsively reached out to clasp Mike's hand, looking silently stricken. "Just got the wind knocked outta me for a second."

"I thought you were _dead_," Bobby burst out. "You fell so far..."

"What happened?" Steve asked, trying his best to slow down his racing heart, now that it seemed Mike was all right.

"We were just... just horsing around," Mike said.

"It was my fault," Bobby blurted out. "I pushed him... I didn't think I pushed him that hard, but he just went right through the wall." He was desperately trying not to cry in front of the girls, and only partially succeeding.

"It wasn't your fault," Mike said quickly.

It took some time to get all the children somewhat calmed down, but when they had finally gone back inside the house, Steve sank down onto the back porch and rested his elbows on his knees, lost in thought.

He and Peggy had worked so hard, so long, to keep this secret. Not only so that Steve could live a quiet life of anonymity, although that _was_ important to him, but also to keep the twins safe. There were undoubtedly people in the world who could find use for a pair of quasi-super soldiers, especially if they could be taken when they were too young to effectively resist. And now Mike had just inadvertently displayed an unusual quality, to say the least, in front of two other kids in the neighborhood. Who knew what Bobby and Jenny would say to their parents tonight? Would suspicions be raised?

Most of their neighbors knew Peggy worked at the Army base but assumed she did some kind of secretarial work, which Peggy was happy to let them believe. But her connection to Project Rebirth wasn't a deep dark secret; it was all there in the Smithsonian for anyone who cared to look, and it was conceivable that someone could put two and two together, and conclude that the twins were part of some new iteration of the experiment.

He knew he would do whatever it took to keep the twins safe, and so would Peggy. But there were concerns beyond their immediate safety. As Dr. Erskine had once pointed out, Steve had learned to respect strength because of his physical weaknesses. His many illnesses, his frequent mistreatment at the hands of others: they had taught him patience. Compassion. Determination to do what was right even in the face of failure. How would his children learn these things? They had been strong and healthy all their lives. They had not even known poverty as he had, or the fear of an existential war hanging over their heads. And he had read a lot about the '60s, about the hedonism and ingratitude that would become rampant in his children's generation, in large part because of the comfort and security their parents had won for them.

How were Mike and Sarah going to handle this new truth about themselves? Their power came to them without price, without sacrifice. They were good children, he knew that, but this knowledge would change them. How could he advise them? His own transformation had come as an adult, long after his character had been established. But they would be in uncharted waters. Was he really qualified to guide them through an experience so different from his own?

And if he wasn't... who was?

"Dad?" a small voice said from behind him.

Steve took a deep breath, coming back to himself, and looked over at his son. Mike was standing a few steps away, twisting his hands together, looking nervous. His dark hair, normally parted and neatly combed to the side, was still in disarray, falling down over his forehead. He had recently hit a growth spurt, and while he was now noticeably taller than Sarah, he hadn't filled out yet, leaving him with a gangly and slightly awkward appearance.

"I'm really sorry about the treehouse," he said anxiously.

"I'm not mad," Steve reassured him quickly, regretting that he had let Mike see him brooding like that. "It was just an accident. You can help me fix it next week, okay? I'll teach you how."

"Okay," Mike said, although he still looked very unsure.

"Did Bobby go home?"

"Yeah."

"Okay," Steve said.

"He really didn't push me that hard." Mike seemed eager to explain. "I was kinda already falling in that direction. I didn't think we were being _that_ rough..." He trailed off.

"I know. It's okay," Steve repeated.

"Do you want me to... go do my chores or something?"

"No," Steve said. "Only if you want. I just... I need to think for a while."

"Okay," Mike said in a small voice, and left.

Steve was still sitting on the back step when he heard the engine of their Ford Consul pull into the driveway, and a few minutes later Peggy came through the back door and looked down at him questioningly.

"The kids are okay," he told her quickly.

"I know they are, I just saw them in the house," Peggy said, "although they were both holed up in their rooms and being suspiciously quiet." She surveyed the damage to the treehouse with some concern. "What happened here?"

She came to sit down beside him, smoothing her full skirt and folding her hands on her lap as she gave him her full attention. He explained briefly but thoroughly.

"Are you telling me he just picked himself up and dusted himself off, Steve-Rogers-style, from something that should have shattered half the bones in his body?" Peggy asked slowly, keeping her voice low in case any of the neighbors were out in their yards.

"That's about it," Steve agreed.

"Well, why are you looking so worried?" Peggy asked with a hint of tartness. "I'm _glad_. If he'd been any other boy, he could have really been hurt, a long fall like that."

"If he'd been any other boy, he wouldn't have gone through the wall and the railing in the first place," Steve said with a touch of weariness. "He's heavier than he should be, and apparently his body's harder than good cedar lumber."

"Steve... we knew something like this might happen some day," Peggy said gently.

"I know."

"We have a plan for exactly this scenario. We should stick to it."

"I know." Steve met her eyes, and gamely tried to shake off his gloom. "You're right. We'll tell them. I'm just... sorry to see it end. Being a normal family. I really enjoyed it while it lasted."

Peggy smiled a little. "We still _are_ normal. Normal for us. Since when have we ever cared how we compare to everyone else?"

He knew she was right. She laced her arm through his and they sat there side by side on the stoop in silence for a minute, lost in their own thoughts.

"How did Mike contrive to break the gate as well?" Peggy suddenly asked.

"The gate?" Steve said blankly. "He wasn't anywhere near it."

Peggy pointed. The gate was hanging at a crazy angle from the lower hinge, the upper hinge a useless twist of metal. The latch on the other side of the gate had snapped off the thick metal frame completely and was lying in the grass. It looked like a rhino had burst through the gate... without bothering to unlatch it first.

"Sarah came through that gate," he said slowly, "running to see what had happened."

"Well," Peggy said after a long pause, staring at the gate, "I suppose that answers that question as well."

* * *

That night after dinner, they called Mike and Sarah into the living room for a family meeting. Steve brought out several copies of a comic book he had created in anticipation of this day and explained to the children simply and clearly that the events he'd depicted in it were real. They were both already familiar with the comic books he'd created over the years about Captain America's battles in World War II and his adventures in the future. Sarah and Mike had naturally assumed that the latter stories were fictional, although Steve had been very careful never to tell them that. But tonight, they both seemed to pick up on the seriousness of the moment from his demeanor and Peggy's quiet confirmation that everything they were about to discuss was true.

And so the four of them took turns reading from the comic book: a story unlike the others that were packed full of battles and tech and noise and conflicts. This one was a simple love story, starting from the day Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter had met at Camp Lehigh up until they moment they had said their last goodbyes over the radio as the Valkyrie went down. But the story didn't end there.

At the center of the comic book he had created a pair of illustrations with no words: On one side, Peggy as a lone figure dressed in mourning, walking away from The Stork Club; on the other side, Steve on the Brooklyn Bridge with the modern New York City skyline behind him, gazing longingly at Peggy's picture in his compass.

Then came the turn: a full-page spread depicting the quantum tunnel in Avengers Headquarters, with its delicate mirrors suspended overhead and a single suited figure standing on the platform clutching a case in one hand and Thor's hammer in the other, with the caption: "The impossible became possible."

The second half of the story showed Steve reuniting with Peggy back in 1945. His decision to take the name of Grant Buchanan and live a life of anonymity. Their wedding. The birth of the twins. And finally, a succession of images showing all the little moments in their lives up until the present day that had formed their own family's version of a happily ever after.

It took a long time for the four of them to get through the story, with each new revelation bringing a fresh round of amazement from the twins, and sometimes a few tears. They stayed up late into the night, answering a thousand questions from Mike and Sarah. When the children finally understood everything and the shock had subsided somewhat, the four of them got up stiffly from their seats and agreed to go to bed. No doubt there would be more questions later, but for now they were all exhausted, wrung out from the emotion and the lateness of the hour.

Mike was completely thrilled with the revelations of the night, and didn't bother hiding it. Already he was asking Steve for lessons in hand to hand fighting, eager to test the limits of his strength. Sarah, however, had flatly refused to entertain any talk of fighting herself, no matter whether it was Peggy or Steve doing the teaching.

"Well, we just found out in the course of one night that Dad is a superhero, that monsters and aliens are real, and so is magic and time travel," Mike said. "I can't _wait_ to find out what's in store for us tomorrow. Night, Mom. Night, Dad. Night, Sarah." He hugged everyone swiftly and then jogged up the stairs to bed, whistling a jaunty tune as he went.

Sarah was being even quieter than usual, though, and a few minutes after she went into her bedroom, Steve knocked softly on her door. She called him in, and when he opened the door, he found her sitting on the edge of her bed, dressed in her pajamas yet not looking like she was ready for sleep. Her blond hair tumbled around her shoulders in waves, and she somehow looked younger than she really was.

"You okay?" he asked her softly. "I know this is a lot to deal with. I'm sorry if we upset you."

"Upset? Not exactly," Sarah said slowly. "The more I think about it... I really shouldn't have been surprised. The way Mom always talked about Captain America... I kinda figured she must have had a little bit of a crush on him."

In the middle of moving aside a stack of Sinatra and Elvis albums so that he could sit down, Steve couldn't help but let a hint of a smile touch his lips, and seeing it, Sarah grudgingly smiled a little too. "I guess it was a little more serious than that," she said wryly.

Then she shook her head slowly. "And what's even weirder is, I always thought you looked a little bit like him, underneath that beard of yours, but I just figured Mom must have looked for someone like him to marry. I mean, you even _act_ like him." She exhaled loudly. "But I never thought for a second that you actually _were_..." She trailed off.

"Are you sorry?" he asked.

"Sorry?" She gave him a genuinely startled look. "Daddy... you were one of my heroes, as far back as I can remember. _Both_ of you. The real you, and Captain America, too." She met his eyes as he sat down on the bed beside her. "And I'm proud_,_ _really_ proud, to be your daughter. But I'm flipping my lid a little bit, too. I'm... I'm not what I thought I was."

"You're exactly who you've always been," he said quietly. "You're a good person. That's all I've ever wanted for you. I don't want you to feel like you have to live up to any expectations."

"It isn't about that," Sarah said. "I never _wanted_ to be anything special. I didn't think I was." She stared into the distance, looking unhappy. "Mike's not going to be able to try out for the football team like he wanted to, is he? And I'm going to have to give up gymnastics. My team was supposed to start competing this year."

"Honey..."

"We'd be cheating, Dad," she said flatly. "It wouldn't exactly be fair, would it? Everything comes to us too easily. Not like everyone else."

"You've always worked just as hard as any of the other girls," he said firmly.

"The other girls weren't super-soldiers," she whispered.

"Sarah, you don't have to think of yourself as a soldier," Steve said, emphasizing the words very clearly. "I know you're not interested in fighting. That was what _I_ agreed to do with my gift, but you're free to do whatever you want with yours. You don't have to fight."

"But that's what this was designed for," Sarah said, pressing her hand against her heart and looking almost angry. "Isn't it?"

Steve sighed. "This may not have been true of everyone at the SSR, but Dr. Erskine made it very clear to your mother when she recruited him that he had no intention of creating a human killing machine. He was trying to _save_ lives, not destroy them, and I did my best to fulfill his wishes."

"Well, what _else_ am I supposed to do with this?" she demanded.

Steve thought carefully before answering. "My childhood wasn't always easy. I was almost constantly sick. How many times have you been sick or hurt, growing up?"

"Practically never," she admitted, sniffling.

"The serum did much more than make a person fit for winning wars... or gymnastics competitions." He stroked her hair gently. "It made us healthy. You want to be a doctor. You know what a gift that alone can be."

"But it's something I wanted to help _others_ with," Sarah said. "I didn't expect anything... extraordinary for myself. I mean... you're really in your 50s now, aren't you? But you look like you're mom's age. Is that going to happen to me, too?"

"I don't know," he said honestly. "You may only have some of my enhancements. The effect might not be so dramatic for you. But yes, I think you can expect to have better health than most people have. Your life may be extended, too."

Sarah let out a shaky breath. "But that was what I wanted to do for everyone else," she repeated softly, her eyes going distant.

* * *

There were, as they had anticipated, many more questions from the children to come. Within days it had occurred to Mike to ask, with a mischievous glint in his eye, for a prediction of the future.

"What kind of a prediction do you want?" Steve asked.

"Next president," Mike said promptly.

"Don't you want to know who's going to win the World Series this year?" Steve asked, surprised.

Mike gave him a strange look. "Are you kidding me, Dad? That would spoil all the fun of watching it. But I don't actually care about the _president_."

Shaking his head a little, but smiling, Steve glanced over at Peggy. "You want to get the picture?"

She promptly stepped into the guest bedroom that doubled as their home office, and came back a few moments later with a small framed picture.

"Remember when I went to Washington, D.C. last fall?" Peggy asked Mike. She handed the picture to him. "Here he is. I had my picture taken with him. The senator from Massachusetts, Jack Kennedy."

"Him?" Mike said in surprise, looking at the photo, and Sarah leaned to look over his shoulder curiously. "He looks way too young to be president."

"Youngest president ever elected," Steve confirmed.

"Wait." Mike frowned. "Mom, didn't you say he was Catholic?"

"Mmm-hmm."

"We're actually going to vote in a _Catholic_?" Mike was amazed.

"So your father claims." Peggy met Steve's eyes and smiled, adding: "He hasn't been wrong yet."

Steve nudged Sarah, who was sitting next to him. "You want a prediction of your own?" he asked her.

She shook her head. "I believe you, Daddy. You don't have to prove it."

"Oh, I believe him too," Mike interjected swiftly. "I just want the fun of being in the know!" He laughed with delight at the thought. "Hey Mom - what was he like? Our future president?"

Peggy grew thoughtful. "He asked me what I thought about President Eisenhower's new NASA program. He said he saw the use of the ARPA because of its military applications, but he worried that trying to chase Russia into space might turn out to be a boondoggle."

"What do you say?" Mike asked curiously.

Peggy shrugged nonchalantly. "I told him that a lot of hopeful talk about American exceptionalism and the grandeur of science could win him the hearts of every man, woman and child in the country." She paused. "Do you know, I think I may have convinced him."

Mike suddenly shot a suspicious look at Steve. "_Is_ NASA going to be a boondoggle?" he asked.

Steve raised his eyebrows at Mike. "I'm not going to tell you everything. Wait and see for yourself."

Later that night, when Mike and Peggy had gone out on an errand, Sarah unexpectedly turned off the radio program that was playing and came to sit by Steve on the couch, looking at him with a silent question in her eyes. He put down the sketchpad he was holding so he could put his arm around her shoulders instead, and willingly she snuggled up against him.

"Dad?" she asked.

"Yeah."

"I've been thinking about the Asgardians," she said. "And the Masters of the Mystic Arts."

"What about them?" he asked.

She shrugged a little, trying to look nonchalant and not quite succeeding. "Now that I know that they're real... I was just wondering how they did their magic," she said.

"_How?_" Steve repeated. He thought for a moment. "I'm not really sure, to be honest."

"I've been reading through all your comics again," she said. "And I can't figure it out. The Asgardians... it's like everything they made had magic worked into it somehow. Like the Soul Forge that Jane Foster saw. How did they build that? I mean, could any of them learn how to do something like that, or were some of them just born with magic, and only they could do it?"

Steve thought for a moment. "I'm not sure about the Asgardians. With the Masters of the Mystic Arts, I think it was just a skill they learned, like anything else. I remember Wong told us at Tony's wedding about a man who had stayed with them long enough to learn how to walk again - he had some kind of paralysis - but he decided not to stick around and join their cause. He just went back home and lived a normal life."

Sarah suddenly sat up straight. "He used magic to make himself walk again?" she demanded.

"That's what Wong said. It wasn't permanent, though. He had to use magic continually to make it work. When Rhodey found that out, he wasn't interested in pursuing it any further for himself. He said Tony's braces worked well enough for what he needed."

Sarah deflated somewhat. "So unless we teach every sick and injured person on Earth to use magic on themselves..."

Steve frowned a little, seeing now where she was going with this.

"If magic could be used to heal someone permanently, I think Dr. Strange would have known," he said. "And as a doctor, I don't think he would have held something like that back from the world." He thought for a moment. "Actually, Strange himself had some kind of injury - nerve damage to his hands, I think - and Wong said his hands would still shake unless he was actively focused on channeling magic through them."

Sarah's shoulders sagged and, as so often happened, she seemed to retreat into her own private world of thought where no one could follow her.

* * *

At other times throughout the next few weeks, both the twins were somber. While they were determined not to compete in their chosen sports as they had originally planned, feeling that it wouldn't be fair to the other kids, they couldn't always hide their disappointment about it. But a couple of weeks later, they came to Peggy and Steve, suddenly excited about an idea they had cooked up between them.

"We were tired of feeling sorry for ourselves," Mike explained, "and then we realized, we're not the only kids who want to play sports but can't. What if we found all the boys in our school - and maybe some of the other schools around here, too - who wanted to play football but didn't make the team for whatever reason, and made a kind of practice team? Or actually, _two_ practice teams, so we could play each other? Maybe some of the boys could get good enough to play on a real team the next year. And you could help, Dad! You could be one of the coaches."

"I don't know how to play football," Steve said.

Mike creased his brow. "But-"

"I weighed 100 pounds soaking wet in high school," Steve reminded him. "No one would let me on the field, not even to carry water."

"Oh, yeah. I forgot." Mike looked crestfallen for a moment, but then he perked up. "Well, we can find a couple of dads to help, anyway."

"You're talking about working not only with boys who weren't big enough or good enough to make the cut, but also the boys who didn't make the team because of their grades or their behavior," Steve pointed out. "That's going to be a pretty challenging group to pull together and make into a team."

"I know," Mike said. "It's going to be a lot of work. We know that." He and Sarah exchanged glances. "But Dad, if Mom can make all those different people at S.H.I.E.L.D. work together and play nice, and if you could pull together a bunch of soldiers from different countries and turn them into the Howling Commandos..." He shrugged. "Why can't we do this?"

"And I had an idea too," Sarah put in, although as usual she had been hanging back and letting Mike do most of the talking. "What if we found all the girls who wanted to be on the cheer team and didn't make the tryouts? Maybe I can't compete in gymnastics, but I could teach them what I know, and we could make a cheer squad for when the practice teams play each other. It would help it feel like a real game, make it something special."

Peggy smiled at them both. "I think it's a great idea."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** What do you think so far? Is everything making sense, and what has captured your interest? Take a moment and leave a review!_


	9. Chapter 9

_**Author's note:** Thanks to those who have left reviews: Guest, dissatisfied user, LaneFlames2014 and also SJS300 (your story sounds different from mine, let me know when you start posting and I will check it out!). I appreciate the feedback from everyone!_

* * *

**1965**

Mike and Sarah's teenage years flew by in a flurry of homework and football and cheer and their first tentative attempts at dating, and before Steve and Peggy knew it, they were sitting in the audience for the twins' graduation ceremony, fighting back tears as they watched their children walk across the stage to accept their diplomas. Mike had finally grown into his height, looking less like a gangly teenager and more like a man, to the point that if it weren't for the difference in hair color, Peggy admitted she could hardly tell the difference between Steve and Mike from behind and at a distance.

Sarah, who had always acted older than she looked, had finally found some equilibrium in that respect. She was beautiful enough that Steve worried about how she would be treated by the young men around her now that he would no longer be able to keep a close eye on her, especially since she had retained all her gentleness from her childhood years, but she also had a good dose of practicality that she'd inherited from Peggy, and he repeatedly reminded himself that she would be fine. At the end of the summer she was bound for George Washington University in Washington, D.C., determined to pursue a medical career. Mike had plans to go to American University, just 5 miles away from her, to study international affairs as a stepping stone to becoming a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent.

But those plans went out the window the day he was drafted to fight in the Vietnam War.

* * *

The day they saw him off for his Army training, Mike was much more subdued than normal, and looked as though he would rather have skipped the whole farewell routine completely. He had always hated serious moments, and his tendency was to lighten the mood with jokes and good-natured teasing, but he had taken one look at his sister's silently stricken expression from the moment she had come downstairs that morning and had been visibly restraining himself ever since. The result had been a strangely quiet and awkward ride to the train station for the whole family.

They walked him to the platform, but when it was time to part, the tears Peggy had been valiantly holding back all morning started to spill down her cheeks.

"Mom, I'll be fine," Mike said swiftly. "You taught me how to shoot as well as you do, and I learned hand fighting from the best soldier in the world, remember?"

Peggy didn't say anything, but Steve knew from the look on her face that she was thinking what he was thinking: that in the chaos of a battlefield, sometimes even the best of soldiers got unlucky... and despite all the physical advantages Mike had, he wasn't immortal anymore than Steve himself was.

"This won't be the same kind of war your mother and I fought," Steve reminded him. "You'll be an outsider, stuck in the middle of a civil war. Both sides are locked in the conflict, and neither one is going to give up easily. Your commanders aren't looking to take territory and hold it. They just won't have enough numbers for that. You'll be constantly falling back and moving back in. Make sure you watch your squadron's backs at all times... and that they know to watch yours."

"I know, Dad," Mike said with a touch of impatience. "I remember everything you told me."

"Well, it makes me feel better to say it again."

"You have a unique opportunity, darling," Peggy said, a little calmer now that she had dabbed the tears away with a handkerchief. "Sometimes, in the course of a war, a soldier can be so focused on surviving in the moment that he can lose sight of the larger picture. He can teach himself to believe the propaganda about his enemies, to forget what's wrong and what's right beyond the needs of the moment. You'll have your objectives to fulfill, and many of them will be good and right, and maybe some of them less so. Be sure to _think_ about every order you're given, and show restraint when you can. Don't ever forget that the people you're fighting are still _people_, just like you. Perhaps your example can help your comrades remember it, too."

"I'll make you proud, Mom," he promised quietly.

Peggy smiled through her tear-filled eyes. "You already do," she said, reaching up to lay a hand against his cheek. Then she hugged him fiercely and didn't let him go for a long time.

Then it was Steve's turn to embrace him. "I love you," he said in Mike's ear. Those words had fallen from his lips to his son so many times over the years that they should have been shopworn by now, but somehow they were every bit as potent as they were the first day he had spoken them to Mike: the day Peggy had told him she was pregnant, and Steve had placed his hand on her belly in awe that something so small could already be so precious to him.

"Love you, Dad," Mike said, hugging him back swiftly.

Then Mike turned toward Sarah. She was holding her eyes open wide, trying desperately not to cry and, for the moment, succeeding.

"Bye, Mike. I'm sorry I ruin half your jokes by being so serious all the time," she said.

Mike laughed. "I'm sorry I ruin half your serious moments by being such a clown all the time."

They hugged each other, her blonde head in striking contrast against his dark hair, and then Mike rested his forehead on hers and murmured something quietly that only Sarah could hear. She nodded silently, and then turned and kissed his cheek.

"Love you, sis," he said, kissing the top of her head in return.

* * *

By the end of the summer, Mike had completed his training as a helicopter pilot and was deployed overseas, and Sarah left for college. Steve and Peggy's once-bustling house sat empty and quiet.

Sarah would come home for visits, of course, and Mike would eventually come back home too - or so he and Peggy fervently prayed every night before bed - but Steve knew things would never really be the same for their family. The director of S.H.I.E.L.D. was prepping for retirement, and Peggy was focused on making sure the transition to a new director would go smoothly. Her hands were more than full. She had declined to hear anything about her future career path, but Steve knew the Council would soon choose her to lead S.H.I.E.L.D. With everyone else in his family moving forward into a new phase of life, Steve came to the decision that it was time for him to make a change, too.

He started by shaving off his beard. He no longer feared recognition, in part because time had changed him enough over the years — he was 60 now — and partly because Captain America simply no longer loomed in the public consciousness. Sales of the old wartime comics and trading cards featuring Captain America had long ago dwindled to a trickle, relegated to a nostalgic trade among a handful of collectible enthusiasts. And Steve was fine with that. Let the past stay in the past.

Inspired by Sarah's example, he filled out the required paperwork, registered for classes, and began attending college, too. He still had a lot of good years ahead of him, and he wanted to do something worthwhile with them. He knew that by the time he finished his certification as a counselor, the Vietnam War would end and the veterans, weary and broken by combat, would finally come home to a less-than-warm welcome. There would be no shortage of people in need of support.

He still made the time to continue working on his project to record the Avengers years. By now his comics sometimes depicted events that Peggy hadn't yet asked to know about, and although he didn't show them to her, she knew where he kept them, and they were never locked up. The trust between them was complete; he would withhold nothing from her, leaving her free to make the choice for herself.

* * *

**1967-1970**

Mike finally came home safe and whole in body, but in his eyes he looked like he had aged 10 years instead of three, although after a time some of the old merriment and mischief came shining through again. He had mastered Vo Binh Dinh, served with honor, and had several medals pinned to his uniform, but he seemed to treasure much more the regular letters he received from Tien, a young Vietnamese woman who had served as an interpreter for his squadron. Mike had quietly explained to the family that she had witnessed his rescue of several men after an ambush, and without question knew that there was something different about him. Peggy and Steve both became concerned at that, but Mike had coolly reassured them that Tien had promised not to say anything to anyone, and that he trusted her.

Mike began attending classes in D.C., as he had originally planned, although both Sarah and Steve had gotten a head start on him and graduated with their bachelors degrees as he was finishing his first year. In a way, Peggy graduated that year too, as the Council named her the director of S.H.I.E.L.D. One of her first acts was to hire an ex-Army officer by the name of Hank Pym as a consultant, recognizing the potential in his cutting-edge particle research.

By then Sarah was immersed in medical school, while Steve had started work as a counselor, and even when his time was filled with important day-to-day tasks, his old friends in the Avengers were never far from his thoughts. In fact, he kept a close eye on his calendar these days, because exciting things were starting to happen.

Bruce Banner was the first to be born, just a few weeks before they rang in the new year of 1970. The twins were home for Christmas, and Steve made a cake, putting a liberal amount of green food coloring in the frosting. He wrote "Happy birthday, Bruce" in purple icing, and they took a Polaroid of it, with the family gathered around the table, grimacing and flexing their muscles. Steve put in a scrapbook labeled "Birth of the Avengers" - the first of many entries to come - and eagerly looked forward to the day he could show it to the Avengers. After all, what was the good of being a time traveler if he couldn't have a little fun with it?

Before long Peggy had to recuse herself when Mike applied to become an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., but he passed the agency's tests and was quickly installed as Agent 45. His surname was known to only a few and was kept out of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s records, since Mike was determined to make it in his career on his own merits, and not as the director's son.

Ironically, he was almost immediately given a mission Peggy could not have trusted to anyone other than her own son: to stand guard over the vault where the Tesseract was kept on a day when it was crucial that the Tesseract _not_ be guarded.

Steve had often wondered at the ease with which Tony had strolled out of Camp Lehigh with the Tesseract - and the ease with which Steve himself had later been able to return it - especially now that he knew that Peggy had known all along the true nature of the Tesseract, and therefore kept it as secure as she possibly could.

Long ago, Peggy had chosen to learn about the Infinity Stones. However, she had also declined to learn more when he offered "rhetorical questions" about future apocalyptic events, which meant she still knew nothing of Thanos and his twisted mission. That made it a little tricky, but Steve respected her wishes and managed it by telling her that the Avengers had invented the time-traveling device to retrieve the Stones for an important reason... without explaining exactly what it was.

"The time-hopping treasure hunt," Mike quipped once Peggy had enlisted him to be the guard on duty during the crucial moment. "One of my favorite bedtime stories." He smiled broadly. "I never thought I'd actually get to help with it."

"All you have to do is turn off the alarms and stay of Tony Stark's sight," Peggy emphasized, and then added, "and keep away anyone else who might wander down while he's there."

"Not anyone," Steve said quickly. Peggy looked at him curiously, and he explained: "Tony bumped into Howard that day."

Peggy looked shocked. "His own father? Well, that seems a little problematic, doesn't it?"

Steve shrugged. "It's already happened. No stopping it now. It isn't as though Howard could recognize him. He hasn't been born yet. And honestly-" He paused. "Tony seeing Howard that day... it was a blessing. A mercy."

Peggy immediately understood what he meant. "It was his last chance to see him, wasn't it?" she asked softly. She had known from the beginning that Tony would one day be killed in action; Steve had found it impossible to hide his grief from her in those early days when it was still fresh.

"Wait. But Howard isn't even supposed to come in tomorrow," Peggy suddenly objected. "He told me he promised Maria he would go with her to her doctor's appointment." She paused for a long moment. "Unless..."

"Unless you call him into work instead," Steve finished.

Peggy looked unhappy. "Oh, I hate to do that. Maria will be upset." She had tried to befriend Maria ever since her marriage to Howard, but their personalities simply didn't mesh; Maria was the daughter of an oil tycoon, born with the proverbial silver spoon in her mouth, and although she was well-meaning, there wasn't much in her life experience to help her understand the perspectives of those who had been born to a harder life. "But I suppose I must. Tony's need is greater."

"What about you, Dad?" Mike asked. "Is there something special I need to do to help you when you return the Tesseract?"

Steve shook his head. "I just walked in moments later and put it back. Nothing complicated. After you see me leave, you'll have to replace the locking mechanism that Tony cut through with his lasers. Hopefully no one else will ever know the Tesseract was even gone."

"And what about the Pym Particles?" Peggy asked. "And don't you dare tell me what you wanted them for," she quickly added. "I don't want to know anything about Hank's future."

"I remember," Steve said patiently. "Just make sure no one but Hank is in his lab tomorrow."

"This is wild, Dad," Mike said, shaking his head in disbelief. "Tomorrow there are going to be two of you there at once? And the third one here at home, and a fourth one sleeping in the ice?"

"It was a busy day for me," Steve said mildly.

"I'll say."

"I wish I could see you, too," Peggy said wistfully.

"That's not a good idea," Steve said.

"I know," Peggy said, although she sounded a little sad. "If we had seen each other, you would have been terribly confused about why I wasn't confused to see you. I suppose it would have spoiled everything, wouldn't it?" She sighed. "I'll stay away from the vault and Hank's lab tomorrow, and just keep close to my office. I promise."

Steve held his silence. He had agreed not to keep important secrets from Peggy, and he had stuck to that vow, but for some reason he found himself jealously guarding that moment when he had seen Peggy through her office window. It had managed to be one of the happiest moments of his life and one of the worst, simultaneously, and he felt strongly that it was for him alone. The moment was too precious for him to even be able to draw it, at least not so far.

The next day Peggy and Mike came home from work and reported that all had gone well; the Tesseract had been taken and returned without incident. The only thing left to do was for Peggy was put on a convincing show of investigating the two intruders reported by one of her people - the suspicious woman from the elevator, Steve had no doubt - and Hank Pym was, predictably, furious over his missing vials. Mike, on the other hand, was giddy with excitement over getting to catch glimpses of both Tony Stark and the younger version of his own father down in the vault.

As Peggy animatedly explained everything that had happened that day, Steve found himself gazing at her, transfixed. She was wearing the same blue dress, her hair just the way he remembered it, her beauty just as perfect. And this time, she really was his. She had been all along.

Slowly but surely, the bittersweetness of his memory of this day was draining away, leaving nothing but the sweetness behind. Knowing that his own son had been watching over him... that Peggy had been smoothing his path before him, though he hadn't known it...

He hadn't been nearly as alone as he had felt.

* * *

**1973**

Sarah earned her medical degree, specializing in epidemiology. She had hardly started her residency when she met a young man by the name of David who was training to be a geneticist, and before long Peggy and Steve discovered the joys and stresses of planning a wedding for a child.

After thoroughly vetting their future son-in-law, the family brought him in on the family secret. He had a right to know, given that any children they might have would be affected by the serum. Fortunately, Sarah had chosen her partner well, and Dave treated the responsibility of keeping the secret with all the gravity it deserved. He was obviously very much in love with Sarah, and he was going to make a fine addition to the Carter family, although Steve could admit to mixed feelings at the thought of giving his daughter away. She had grown into a beautiful young woman, in many ways resembling Peggy despite the blond hair and blue eyes she'd inherited from him. She was tall for a woman, and she still had her gymnast physique, all toned muscles and graceful movements, although she spent more time at the hospital than the gym these days. She had chosen a demanding profession, and she seemed happy with her career choice and elated over the upcoming wedding, yet Steve and Peggy had become aware of a subtle restlessness that was growing inside her, too.

One day as she and Dave and Steve and Peggy were sitting around the kitchen table addressing a stack of wedding invitations, Sarah suddenly confessed what she was struggling with.

"People are coming into the hospital sick and dying, and we're giving them medicines and trying all these different treatments, but half the time they don't_ work_," Sarah said, not hiding her frustration.

"That's life, honey," Steve said gently. "You can't save everyone."

"But that's just it," Sarah said. "We know of a medicine that _does_ work, for all kinds of things. The serum. I can't help but think that a lot of my patients would be helped with nothing more than a simple blood transfusion from me."

"The effect would only be temporary," Peggy said. "The SSR researched along those lines, using extracted white blood cells from your father. Those cells would only stay in their system for a few days, and then they'd be right back where they started from. Your blood isn't a medicine, darling. Even if it were, you couldn't exactly mass-produce it, could you?"

"Maybe it _could_ be a medicine," Sarah said. "If we could isolate the serum somehow..."

"Every single researcher who attempted to replicate Dr. Erskine's formula ended up with an unstable super-soldier on their hands," Steve said emphatically, alarm suddenly shooting through him. He didn't want his own daughter playing around with that particular fire. And it wasn't only because of the danger of creating another Abomination or Red Skull, although that was worrisome enough. Both Dr. Erskine and Howard Stark had died for their research. Or rather, Howard _would_ die, along with his wife. And now Steve knew why Howard had struck out on his own for that particular project, rather than working through S.H.I.E.L.D. Knowing the consequences as well as Steve did, Peggy was steadfast in refusing any suggestion from her researchers that they take another crack at the serum research. There were just too many avenues for abuse.

"I don't want to make more super-soldiers," Sarah said firmly. "I don't need to make my patients strong enough to tip over a truck. I just want to cure their diseases."

Dave suddenly spoke up. "There's a lot happening in the field of genetics right now. We're finally starting to catch up to things Dr. Erskine must have already known. It sounds to me like the serum was a multi-faceted vector for genetic change. It affected the nervous system, the immune system, the cardiovascular system... everything. If we could separate the strands of what changed which system, maybe we could figure out a way to cure disease without also turning the test subject into... well, Captain America."

"What do you think, Daddy?" Sarah asked, looking at him hopefully.

Steve thought for a long minute. He didn't want to throw cold water, and yet...

"You would be working with technology decades behind what General Ross had for his research," he pointed out. "Both of you are smart and hard-working, but you're still just medical residents. The Army had entire teams of the best-educated scientists in the world working to recreate Erskine's formula."

"We won't always be students, Daddy," Sarah said, glancing at Dave.

"This is going to be a long-term project," Dave agreed, meeting her eyes. "We know that."

"But we also have something no one else had, Daddy," Sarah continued. "We have an infinite supply of fresh blood samples from you, for one thing. And with me and Mike we have _three_ stable super-soldiers to study instead of just one."

"What difference would that make?" Steve asked.

"I don't know," Sarah admitted. "Maybe nothing. Maybe something. But Dave can map out our family's genes and find out."

"And there's another advantage we'll have," Dave added. "We'll be able to track the effects of the serum generationally. I mean, right now, we only have two generations. But maybe, sometime soon..." He trailed off, his ears suddenly turning pink.

"Making plans, are we?" Peggy teased them, with a dimple popping out.

"It isn't only us, Mom," Sarah said with a smile, although her cheeks were turning pink, too. "Mike and Tien are getting awfully serious, you know." After years of saving up money and cutting through red tape, Tien had finally managed to make her way to America and had immediately registered as a student in the university nearest to where Mike was living while she worked on earning her citizenship. Neither one of them bothered to make any pretense about her reasons for leaving Vietnam. Everyone in the family knew by now that it was only a matter of time.

"Before we know it, we'll have all kinds of test subjects toddling about the house," Peggy said briskly.

"The things we do for science," Steve said in mock sorrow.

* * *

The day of the wedding came. It was a bittersweet moment for Steve, giving Sarah away, his daughter looking luminous in her wedding dress with the light of pure joy radiating from her eyes. He knew he wasn't really losing her, that a wedding was more of a beginning than an end, but when Sarah kissed his cheek after he had walked her down the aisle and then went to stand by Dave's side, he couldn't help but tear up anyway. Sarah Natalie Carter had become Sarah Natalie Capecci. She was no longer wholly theirs, and she never would be again.

But the day's strangest moment by far came when Howard Stark brought his wife and son to the reception in their backyard that night. Steve had been careful to stay far away from S.H.I.E.L.D. social events, and given that Peggy and Howard were on-again off-again friends, Howard must have thought it strange that Peggy never introduced her husband to him. The Starks' visit to the reception was thankfully short and Steve was able to stay out of sight of Howard and Maria by lurking behind the trellis set up by the table where the desserts were displayed. It was too much to hope for that Howard would not recognize him, even after so many years.

As Steve watched the Starks in the distance, talking to Peggy and the happy newlyweds, a young boy ran up to the dessert table and stood on his tiptoes, trying to reach a particular piece of cake. He looked to be around 4 years old. There were other plates within reach, but he was obviously determined to get the biggest piece of cake there was. He just wasn't quite tall enough to reach it. Steve took pity on him and stepped forward, grabbed the plate, and handed it to him.

"Thank you," the kid mumbled in a hasty perfunctory way, shaking his head to get his mop of dark hair out of his eyes, and he picked up the cake with his hand and took an enormous bite, leaving frosting all over his lips. He had an adult-sized wristwatch on his arm, worn loosely over his suit's sleeve, and there were scratches all around the edges of the watch, as if the cover had been taken off and on many times for tinkering purposes.

"You're welcome, Tony," Steve said, fighting a grin.

Little Tony shot him a surprised look, no doubt wondering why a stranger knew his name. Then he shrugged, stuffed another bite in, and ran off.

As soon as the Starks had left, Steve returned to the reception line, where Peggy was talking to a man who was in his early 30s, with brown hair and a lean but muscular frame. He was accompanied by one of the most beautiful women Steve had ever seen. She was wearing a pleated dress of the kind so popular in this decade, and had perfectly shaped lips, a round feminine curve to her cheeks and feathery waves of blond hair framing her face and tumbling down over her shoulders. More than a few of the wedding guests were doing double takes after glancing in her direction.

"Oh, Grant," Peggy said, spotting Steve and breaking off her conversation with the man to wave him over. "Here's someone I want you to meet. This is Hank Pym, one of our consultants at S.H.I.E.L.D. Hank, this is my husband, Grant. An old Army man like yourself."

They shook hands. Steve was immediately struck by Hank's eyes, blue and intense, and not watery and hidden behind glasses like they had been the first time he had met the man. In fact, Hank looked strikingly different, and not only because he was now decades younger. That weary expression and cynical attitude that Steve had been able to detect with moments of their brief meeting in the future was gone, replaced by an active, curious gaze.

"Nice to meet you," Hank said. "And let me introduce Janet Van Dyne, my... date." He almost seemed afraid to say it, looking simultaneously proud and self-conscious. "Janet, this is Peggy Carter, director of S.H.I.E.L.D. She's been overseeing my research."

"Wonderful to meet you," Peggy said, shaking Janet's hand warmly. "And how did the two of you meet?"

"Hank approached me at the Stark Expo last month, after a presentation I gave about a project I'm working on," Janet said. "He _claimed_ he wanted to know more about my research, but somehow he ended up walking away with my phone number instead." She shot Hank a teasing glance.

"I'm _very_ interested in your research, Janet," Hank quickly assured her, but he couldn't quite conceal the eager nervousness in his body language that made it clear there were other interests in play, too.

Janet laughed. "I can't think what particle physics has to do with entomology, Hank, but if you want to stick with that story, it's all right with me." She linked her arm through his and beamed at him.

"You study insects?" Peggy asked with interest.

"She's doing groundbreaking work exploring the mechanisms behind pheromonal communication between ants," Hank put in.

"Ants are remarkable creatures," Janet said, her eyes lighting up with the change in topic. "They're communal, cooperative; they work as a team to accomplish things a single ant could never do on its own. I think it might be possible to develop a device that humans could use to speak to the ants pheromonally."

"For what purpose?" Peggy asked curiously.

"I have a few ideas for applications," Janet said. She dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "But most people find the topic _unspeakably_ boring." Her eyes slid shut sleepily as her head drooped to the side and she pretended to start snoring.

Hank laughed, his eyes bright with amusement. "Come on, Janet," he said, shaking her "awake." "Let's go give our well-wishes to the bride and groom."

The pair moved over and started talking to Sarah and Dave. After a few minutes, though, Peggy caught Hank's eye and silently beckoned for him to come over. He excused himself from Janet's side and came back over to Peggy and Steve.

"Hank?" Peggy asked in a low voice. "What are you thinking about the ants?"

Hank glanced over at Steve questioningly, and Peggy quickly added, "You can speak in front of my husband."

Hank leaned forward and spoke quietly, and Peggy and Steve leaned in close to hear. "The cameras we were able to miniaturize with my particles," Hank whispered. "All the drones we've built to carry them have been too noisy or too clunky to be of use for surveillance. What if we strapped a camera onto the back of an _ant_? If Janet can learn how to reliably control them, we could get them anywhere we needed them. It would be a lot quieter and less conspicuous than a man-made device; no one would think anything of an ant or two crawling around a room."

Peggy looked intrigued. "Maybe we should bring her in on the project," she said thoughtfully. "I'll have Mitchell Carson run a background check on her." She suppressed a smile, making her dimple pop out. "If you wouldn't find it too much of a burden to work with her. She is _very_ pretty, Hank."

"Yeah, she's too good for me," Hank admitted, but a smile was creeping across his face.

"You'd better get back to her, then," Peggy said, giving him a gentle nudge. Hank rejoined Janet, who was admiring Sarah's wedding dress effusively, and Steve watched them both with a lingering smile.

"I know that look," Peggy said to Steve in a low voice.

"What look?" he asked.

"The same look you got the day I came home and told you I had hired Hank Pym as a consultant," Peggy said. "That smirk of yours that says all too clearly, 'I know something you don't.'"

"You said you didn't want to know specifics about your career," Steve said. "And you told me that includes information about any proteges you might pick up during your time at S.H.I.E.L.D."

"Should I rethink my decision?" she asked him, tilting her head up at him curiously.

"It's up to you."

"But it has to do with Janet Van Dyne," she guessed.

He raised his eyebrows. "Do you really want to know?"

"I don't know," Peggy said with a short laugh. "At least tell me if I should hire her or not."

"You've already decided to," Steve said matter-of-factly. "You don't need me to tell you that. Everything's going to work out the way it's supposed to, whether I tell you anything more or not. That's the beauty of it. It's just a question of whether you want your curiosity satisfied. And honestly, Peggy... I don't know very much, anyway."

It was the truth. He had met Hank only briefly after the battle with Thanos, days before returning to the past. Almost everything he knew about the Pyms had been learned secondhand from Scott Lang. And while Steve knew something of where the Pyms' research would lead one day, having used the Quantum Tunnel himself, he knew Hank's exploration of the Quantum Realm was decades away. First he would have to master becoming Ant-Man, and so far he had not been able to shrink a live subject.

"But there _is_ something you need to know," Steve said, turning to face Peggy fully and speaking slowly for emphasis: "You are, by far, the most beautiful woman at this wedding reception, Peggy Carter." He put his hands on her elbows and looked her over admiringly.

"I'm absolutely certain that isn't true," Peggy said drily, giving a pointed look over at both Janet Van Dyne and their own daughter.

"You don't know what you do to me," he said softly, smoothing back a strand of Peggy's hair. His longing for her had been powerful enough to pull him away from his life and his friends in the future to be with her, and he had never once regretted that decision. And after all these years together, she had no less of a hold on him now. If anything, he loved her more.

Peggy's cheeks flushed with pleasure at the compliment, just as a new song began to play over the loudspeakers, "My Eyes Adored You." They looked over to see that the bride and groom were swaying together on the grass, smiling sweetly at each other. Sarah was barefoot, so as not to be taller than Dave. The wedding guests were joining in the dance, Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne among them.

"What do you think?" Steve asked her with arched eyebrows. "Should we dance at our daughter's wedding?"

"I think we should," Peggy agreed, taking his hand.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** Let me know what you think of this chapter, and if you have any guesses or expectations for what will happen next!_


	10. Chapter 10

_**Author's note:**__ Thanks to Guest, Guest, LatteLady and Jedi Alex Colbent for your reviews! To answer questions, I'm afraid I don't know much about Red Guardian, so he won't be appearing in my story, but you can definitely expect to see some important scenes with Howard Stark in future chapters. I also had no idea Steven Strange had a sister (thanks for giving me an education, guys!), but as for Carol Danvers... well, you may notice that we are almost up to the right year for her origin story. :-)_

* * *

**1974-1986**

There was a lot to celebrate in the Carter family as the '70s advanced. The summer after Sarah's wedding, Mike followed suit, marrying Tien who, like Dave, was brought in on the family secret. By now Mike was making a name for himself at S.H.I.E.L.D. as Agent 45, and Steve was happy to see him settle into a lifestyle reminiscent of Clint Barton's, who just so happened to be born that same year. Like Clint, Mike poured all his ambition into achieving excellence at work, but his heart was never far from his home and wife.

Only a few months after Mike's wedding, the whole family came together again to meet Sarah and Dave's firstborn, a boy they named Abraham in honor of the scientist they were hoping to emulate. Sarah and Dave both took a short leave of absence from their medical practices, partly to care for their newborn but also to get a jumpstart on their personal project of attempting to extract the super-soldier serum from Steve's blood to develop medical applications for it. Steve and Peggy hardly needed the excuse to come over and hold little Bram, but they often joked that they were generously doing it just to help free up Sarah and Dave for their work.

They were lucky they now lived close enough to be of help. That year, Peggy and Steve had made the bittersweet decision to move from the home in New Jersey where they had raised their children and relocate to the Washington, D.C. area. S.H.I.E.L.D. was currently undergoing an agency-wide expansion, and had long ago outgrown its facilities at Camp Lehigh. A new headquarters was now under construction, a modern and spacious building to be located on the Potomac. Peggy was intensely proud of the project, having worked long and hard to see it come to fruition, and Steve hated to think of the Triskelion as he had last seen it, a smoking ruin on the banks of the river as the broken remnants of three helicarriers rained down from the sky. It was even more painful to think that he'd be the one to do it.

He knew there was no point to relitigating the past - his actions had saved 20 million innocent lives, and there was really nothing more to be said about it. He often thought of the words Peggy had spoken to him so many years ago when he had visited her at her bedside a few days before the Project Insight disaster: "You saved the world. We rather mucked it up," she had said with regret, and Steve now saw that Peggy had already known what was wrong with S.H.I.E.L.D.

Still, when he'd first told her, years ago, about Hydra's future infiltration, he hadn't been able to suppress the uneasy pulse of guilt as he admitted, "I shut down the agency you founded."

"_You_ didn't," Peggy had said firmly. "Hydra did. If I were asked to choose between human life and an _institution_, Steve, it wouldn't be a difficult choice." She shook her head. "And if I understand correctly how Arnim Zola's algorithm worked..." She took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I think you must have saved more than just 20 million strangers. What are the odds that our entire family wasn't on that hit list for Project Insight? Not to mention all the best people at S.H.I.E.L.D., the ones I trust the most to do the right thing. Hydra would consider us all a threat... and they'd be right to." There had been a savage undertone to her words.

The destruction of the Triskelion had also been the beginning of the end for the parasitic Hydra, and even if S.H.I.E.L.D. as it had formerly been was destroyed, all the best parts of it had eventually been restored. Now, as he watched the Triskelion be built phase by phase, Steve chose to make a conscious effort to focus on the positive. S.H.I.E.L.D. had done a lot of good from its base in the Triskelion, serving to protect innocent people from threats both earthly and unearthly for many years. It had cultivated people like Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne. Phil Coulson and Maria Hill. Clint Barton and Nick Fury. He himself had fond memories here of his S.H.I.E.L.D. training and early missions with Natasha and Clint fighting by his side. He could not condemn the project just because a handful of evil people would eventually misuse it. Peggy was right to be proud of what she was doing. He was proud of her, too.

* * *

Once he and Peggy were settled in Washington, D.C., Steve busied himself leading therapy sessions at the Department of Veteran Affairs, his choice inspired by a good man of his former acquaintance. By the time Ronald Reagan took office, Sarah and Dave had four children and Mike and Tien had three. Like Peggy, Mike was based at the Triskelion, and Sarah and Dave had both taken jobs at George Washington University Hospital, so they all lived within a short drive from each other. The Carter cousins saw each other so frequently that they were as close as siblings, and Steve and Peggy spent much of their free time with all of them.

On the day the family gathered to celebrate the day of Sam Wilson's birth, Steve watched his small grandchildren excitedly running around the house wearing sunglasses and cardboard wings strapped to their backs, and he thought back to the day he'd come to the VA and Sam had asked him a simple question he hadn't been able to answer: What makes you happy?

He looked around at the chaos in the kitchen. Sarah, attempting to frost the cake with a harried expression on her face, stopped to wave the chocolatey spatula at Mike's oldest, Natty, and her own Maggie, who were running around underfoot and shrieking as only 5-year-old girls can, trying to shoo them back to the dining room. Bram, who took his position as the oldest grandchild very seriously, shouted at them indignantly to get out of the way. Harrison had dashed up to the counter and very nearly succeeded in getting his fingers in the frosting, only to be snatched away at the last moment by Peggy, who already had her arms occupied with little Steven. Steve felt a little guilty about the fact that he wasn't helping with crowd control, but newborn baby Samantha was sound asleep in his arms, and he didn't want to jar her.

Thankfully, Mike and Dave came back in then and started wrangling the kids, and by the time Tien had set the table and Sarah brought over the cake, things had settled down to a dull roar. The kids gathered around the cake to pose with their wings for the obligatory picture to be added to the Birth of the Avengers photo album. They were still under the impression that they were dressing up as a comic book character their Grandpa Grant had invented, but one day, they too would learn the whole story.

Only 40 years to go before he could show Sam this photo. Steve could hardly wait for that day, and not only because he thought Sam would get a kick out of it. More than anything, he wanted to tell Sam that he had finally found out the answer to his question.

_This. This is what makes me happy._

* * *

In the early 80s, Sarah and Mike each added one last child to their families, and then, somewhere in Russia, Natasha Romanoff joined the world. Steve had endless fun watching his youngest two grandchildren grow and reach each new stage of development, all the while imagining his old friend at the same stages.

Between family and work, Steve's life was fulfilling and he wasn't looking for more; when it came to S.H.I.E.L.D. matters, he was content to be a shadow adviser for Peggy and leave the heavy lifting to her. But despite all the foreknowledge Steve had about history, his personal life still had some surprises in store for him.

When Steve had first met Hank Pym as the Avengers and their allies met in the aftermath of the battle to decide how to handle the return of the Infinity Stones, the scientist had been an old man. Now the shoe was on the other foot: Hank was in his 30s, married to Janet and raising a daughter, while Steve was twice his age, with a grandchild the same age as young Hope. Yet despite the differences, to Steve's surprise the two of them made an immediate connection and quickly became good friends. Hank was not yet tired and cynical, and thanks to their similar military experience and a shared interest in baseball, among other things, they found a lot to talk about.

Janet had joined Hank as a S.H.I.E.L.D. adviser and together the couple had unlocked the secrets to shrinking live subjects. They worked to develop several varieties of shrinking suits, as well as the communication devices they used to control ants. Peggy became close friends with Janet, and frequently pled with the Pyms to move their laboratory into the Triskelion so they could eliminate the constant travel between their lab in San Francisco and S.H.I.E.L.D.'s base in D.C. But Hank was unmoving; he was fiercely protective of his technology and did not trust S.H.I.E.L.D. to keep it safe from misuse.

Steve felt a certain amount of responsibility for that; when several vials of Pym Particles had gone missing from Hank's old lab at Camp Lehigh back in 1970 and S.H.I.E.L.D. had been unable to find the culprits or recover the vials, Hank had been livid. On the other hand, Steve knew Hank's distrust would ultimately lead to a good end. Hank's eventual furious resignation from S.H.I.E.L.D. meant that his research would be safely out of reach of the growing influence of Hydra, and yet it would be ready in time for the Avengers when they would need it to go after the Infinity Stones. But in the meantime, Hank was becoming S.H.I.E.L.D.'s first enhanced operative since the days of Captain America. The Ant-Man had been born.

Hank carried out his first few covert missions on his own, but eventually Janet, with Peggy's support and encouragement, persuaded him to let her join him wearing a winged suit they had dubbed "The Wasp." Together they were making a big impact - or, more accurately, a _tiny_ impact - on world events.

* * *

**1987**

One spring evening Steve went out to the backyard, partly to keep company with Peggy as she worked to plant pansies in pots before the sun went down, but mostly to work out the right words he needed to say in order to hold what was going to be a difficult conversation with his wife.

He sank down into the stone bench and, for a few minutes, watched Peggy smile over her work as the evening sun slanted through the trees. She had always loved gardening in her free time, which she unfortunately never had much of. But, as Peggy always said optimistically, that was what retirement was for. She had a dream of one day buying a cottage back home in Winchester and designing a traditional English garden around it. Steve hoped it would come true, and thought it probably would: her post-retirement S.H.I.E.L.D. file in the future had in fact listed a U.K. address for her, and now that she was in her late 60s it could be happening soon. He was glad he didn't know too many specifics about it; as a time traveler, he treasured the occasional surprise.

But tonight, he was going to have to give Peggy a surprise, and unfortunately it wasn't going to be a pleasant one.

"Peggy," he said. She glanced up at him expectantly, both hands still in the dirt.

"You've told me before that if I knew you were going to lose someone close to you, you would want some warning," he said gently. "I need to know if that's still what you want."

He watched, heart sinking, as her cheerful expression was slowly replaced by one of apprehension.

"Is it time?" she asked at last.

"Yes."

"Not if it's our children," she said quickly, barely repressing a sudden panic. "Not if it's their children. Oh, Steve-"

"I don't know anything about that," he said. "Our own family's future is a mystery to me. I'm talking about a friend."

Peggy nodded and took a deep breath, calming herself. She turned away from him and deliberately took a minute to turn on the hose and wash the dirt off her hands. When it was done, she joined him on the bench and turned to face him.

"All right. Yes. I haven't changed my mind. Just tell me... How far away is it? Tell me that first."

"That's the trouble," Steve said. "I don't know the exact date. I only heard about what happened secondhand, and I... I just didn't know then that it would be important to me later. I didn't get details. I know it's sometime soon."

"All right," Peggy said again, her voice going up a little higher.

"It's an unusual situation," Steve said, anxious to give her the whole picture, both the good and the bad. "This friend... they're not going to die. They're going to meet with an accident that was like mine in some ways. They'll be believed dead, and it'll be a long time before rescue comes. So long that... you won't get to see them again. For you, it will be as if they're dead."

Peggy was silent for a long moment, processing that. Finally, she visibly steeled herself. "Who is it?" she asked.

"It's Janet Van Dyne," he said gently.

Instantly her face crumpled. "Oh, no! No!" she cried, shaking her head in denial. She cupped her hands over her mouth, tears springing to her eyes. "No!"

"I'm so sorry, Peggy," he said, reaching out to her, feeling his own grief surge in response to hers. Janet was so brilliant and full of life, beautiful on the inside as well as the outside. She was a good wife and mother. A good friend to Peggy. He'd dreaded sharing this news.

"What happened?" Peggy demanded tearfully.

"A group of separatists is going to hijack a Soviet missile site and launch a nuclear warhead at the United States," he told her wearily. "Hank and Janet were sent on a mission to deactivate the missile, and they managed to stop it. But Janet had to shrink down between the molecules to do it."

He didn't have to explain to Peggy what that meant. There was no coming back from going subatomic. None of the Pyms' cautious attempts over the years to send miniaturized probes into the Quantum Realm had ever been successful; the probes simply didn't come back once they went subatomic. Nothing did.

"But she's a _mother_," Peggy whispered, horror-stricken.

"I know." He hugged her close, comforting her. "I hate to think of it, too. But Janet saved a lot of lives, Peggy. I know that doesn't make it any easier to bear, but she must have felt that it was worth the sacrifice."

He held her in silence for several minutes, giving her the time she needed. Finally, she pulled away and looked up at him seriously. "When you say that they were sent on a mission... you mean _I_ sent them on that mission," she said matter-of-factly.

"I don't know, Peggy," he said wearily. "Probably so."

"And I still have to do it," she realized, widening her eyes. "If it's already done..."

"You don't have to do _anything_," Steve said firmly. "You're free, Peggy. Knowing the future doesn't take away your agency. You're going to choose whatever you think is right and do it, the same way you always have."

"But are you absolutely certain we can't change what happened?" she asked, suddenly fierce.

"I'm sure," he said. "Not without opening up an alternative reality. And even if you could, Peggy... would you?"

"I don't know," she said, thinking rapidly. "If we could find a way to stop the missile without losing her... we've saved how many lives before? How would this be different?"

"Because Janet made the choice," he said simply. "She did it willingly. And if we manipulated events to change things around, we'd be unmaking her choice. We'd be making ourselves out to be gods, controlling everyone's fate according to our own judgement. And no matter how well-intentioned we are... I'm not prepared to do that. To become that. Are you?"

Peggy sighed. "I suppose... I wouldn't want someone to go back through my life and take away all the things that hurt me," she admitted slowly. "All the good things in my life were tangled up with the bad things. If I lost the bad, I'd lose the good, too."

She didn't know yet how right she was. Because Janet's sacrifice hadn't only saved the people who would have died if the Soviet missile had struck land. The knowledge she would eventually bring back with her from the Quantum Realm would make it possible for the Pyms to develop the Quantum Tunnel, leading to the defeat of Thanos. The private grief of Hank and Hope would be transformed into a public victory for countless lives across the galaxy. And one day the three of them would be reunited.

But that was a cold comfort now. Right now, all Steve could think about was that a man was about to lose his wife. A little girl was about to lose her mother. And all they could do was wait, watch, and grieve for them.

* * *

Peggy didn't waste the time that she'd been given. She knew she couldn't stop what was going to happen, and she accepted it - but she was determined to do what _was_ in her power.

For herself, that meant that she made the most of every moment that she saw Janet, making sure she said everything she needed to say to her friend before the end, but more than that, she was fixated on helping Hank and Hope in any way she could.

The Pyms had planned a long family vacation for later in the summer, but Peggy managed to persuade Janet to take it sooner. After they came back, Janet eagerly showed Peggy all of their vacation photos, with the family playing on the beach, and riding the teacups, and Hope standing in front of Sleeping Beauty's castle with her Mickey Mouse ears on, smiling happily. It had taken all the strength Peggy had to admire the photos with Janet and wait until she got home to do her crying.

"Are you sorry I told you?" Steve asked her that night once she was calmer.

"No," Peggy said wearily. "I hate this, but if I didn't know, you'd just be carrying this burden alone, and I wouldn't like that either. At least this way we can grieve together. But sometimes... I wish there was some way we could warn them, too." She laughed humorlessly. "And then I remember that I can't even bear to have you tell me when _I'm_ going to die. Nor would I want to know when _you_ are. I can't do that to Hank and Janet, either."

Steve bowed his head for a moment, thinking. Like him, Dr. Strange had seen the future. He had known exactly how and when Tony was going to die, and he'd done nothing to stop it. In fact, he had intentionally acted in such a way to ensure that it _did_ happen. Only now did Steve begin to appreciate just how painful that must have been for Strange. Like leading a lamb to the slaughter. The only saving grace was that the lamb had gone willingly, and Strange had the dubious comfort of having received visions of the terrible futures in which Tony _didn't_ die and far worse things had happened instead.

And Strange, in his wisdom, had staunchly refused right up to the last moment to tell Tony what he knew.

_If I tell you what happens, it won't happen._

Steve set his jaw and renewed the commitment he had made long ago: He would not make the mistake Thanos made, and make other people's choices for them. Hard as it was, it was right for him and Peggy to hold their silence. Steve briefly wondered, not for the first time, if it was dangerous for him to tell even Peggy these things in advance. Would Strange have approved of that? Maybe not. But the Ancient One had trusted Steve to travel to the past without making a mess of things, and he in turn trusted Peggy even more than he trusted himself. The greatest comfort of his life was knowing that whatever might happen, they would face it together.

* * *

Peggy came up with one more idea of how they could ease Hank's burden when the time came. After she had explained it to Mike and Tien, they readily agreed to help, and so the two of them began to work as quickly as possible to finish their basement in preparation for it.

One rainy day, Steve came over to help with the kids, since Mike was needed at work and school had just gotten out for the summer, leaving all four kids underfoot just as Tien was trying to finish up the work downstairs.

The older two, fortunately, were adept at entertaining themselves. Mike and Tien's oldest child Natty, teetering at the edge of adolescence, ate, breathed and slept only for her ballet lessons, and today she was in the living room dressed in her neon leotard and leggings, going through one of her routines accompanied by the incongruous sounds of her brother Harrison, who was practicing enthusiastically on his tuba in the same room at the same time.

To distract the two younger kids, Steve brought out a stack of puzzles, and Sammy made steady progress on a pink-and-purple-splashed Lisa Frank puzzle as she chattered away about the last few days of school and her plans for the summer. The youngest, Joe, made a half-hearted effort to put together his Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles puzzle, but quickly grew bored with it and with the talk, and ended up playing Tetris on the Gameboy instead. Steve had taught him how to play the game; living his life backwards from everyone else meant that he frequently got to introduce his children and grandchildren to the latest fads and technological advances, rather than the other way around. Taking the whole family to see the "Star Wars" movies on their opening nights had been one of the highlights of this phase of his life.

The phone rang. Steve got up to answer it, knowing Tien would not want to stop her work downstairs to take a phone call unless it was an emergency.

It was Sarah.

"Hi, Daddy," she said, and in the background he could hear her kids making their own jumble of happy noise to match what Mike's kids were doing. "Do you have a minute?"

"You bet. Are you ready for new blood samples from me?" He'd been expecting a request like that sometime soon. They had long ago settled into a routine of regular blood draws to assist Sarah and Dave in their quest to find medical applications for the super-soldier serum. The two of them had decided to focus on attempting to treat heart disease first. "Might as well start with the biggest killer," Sarah had reasoned, and Dave had agreed with her. Steve had assumed at first that meant cancer, but Sarah set him straight. "Heart disease kills more people," she had explained, "and it's the more promising avenue for us in this case. We can't know for sure whether the serum has ever prevented you from developing cancer, but we do know for sure that it cured your heart palpitations."

Over the phone, Sarah sighed. "No. I mean, yes, we've used up the last batch you gave us, but... we don't even know what step to take next. The truth is, we've run into a brick wall." Her frustration was obvious from the tone of her voice.

"What happened?" Steve asked, concerned. "I thought Dave had managed to extract the components affecting the cardiovascular system. The animal testing-"

"The results are wildly inconsistent," Sarah said. "Some of the subjects become healthier, yes. Some of them _don't_. Instead they develop obsessive behavior... either they won't stop eating, or they won't stop trying to mate, or they sleep themselves to death. Dave and I have gone over and over our process, and we just can't identify what makes the difference between failure and success."

"It's the same problem every other researcher ran into," Steve said wearily. "The serum isn't stable."

"But we know it's _possible_ to be stable," Sarah said. "That's the part that kills me. You turned out perfectly. Obviously Dr. Erskine knew something we didn't. Or he had some tool we didn't. He just didn't see fit to share it in his notes, and I would really like to know why."

"He didn't want anyone creating super soldiers outside his control," Steve said, surprised she would even ask. Wasn't it obvious?

"Well, then he failed," Sarah said bluntly. "How many unstable super soldiers did we end up with? The Hulk, the Abomination, the Red Skull... It isn't impossible to replicate the chemical components of Erskine's serum, Dad. The Army researchers did it for General Ross, and even Dave and I have managed to do it. It's establishing stability that's the real trick. I just keep thinking that we're missing a big part of the picture, and I don't know how to find out what it is."

"You'll get it, honey," Steve said. "I know you can do this."

Sarah sighed. "I feel like we need to start back at square one, think completely outside the box. And it's hard because everything is always so crazy at home. We have the kids to think of, and I want to be there for them, but I also feel this urgency with my research... I don't know, Dad. I feel like I'm being pulled in two, and I don't even know where to go next."

"You know I can help as often as you need me to," Steve said. "I can stop taking new clients, free up some time to come watch your kids while you and Dave are working on this."

Sarah didn't answer for a moment. "I hate to ask that of you," she said at last.

"Well, playing with my grandkids is a terrible sacrifice, but if that's what needs to be done to save the world, I guess I don't have much choice." Sammy glanced up from her puzzle and made a face at Steve, overhearing his comment, and Steve reached over and tugged her braid. "Grandpa!" she complained, pushing his hand away, but she was smiling. Steve knew he wasn't supposed to have favorites among his grandchildren, but the fact of the matter was, whichever grandchild he was with at any given moment tended to feel like his favorite, which meant that right now, Sammy was the lucky one.

Over the phone, Sarah laughed, as he had hoped she would. "Dad, you really are too good to live on this Earth, you know that?"

"I know, but that one time I died, it just wouldn't stick."

She laughed again. "Well, do me a favor and stay away from any freezers. Your family hasn't finished with you yet."

"Honey?" Steve said quickly. "Mike's phone keeps beeping, I think someone else is trying to get through." As always, he felt a moment of regret that he didn't have his cell phone with caller ID anymore. Well, another decade or two and it would come back. He was used to waiting for things like that.

"Okay. I'll let you go. Love you, Dad."

"Love you."

He pressed a button and answered the second call coming in. There was a long pause, and then he heard Peggy's voice say: "Steve?"

Steve, not Grant? When she was calling from work in the middle of the day? "What's wrong?" he asked automatically.

"It's happened," Peggy said, her voice coming in a little fainter than usual. "Janet's gone."

Heart sinking, he held the phone and listened patiently as Peggy worked to get through the explanation of what had happened, the details of which he had never known: first Hank had attempted to go subatomic to deactivate the missile, but the regulator in his suit had malfunctioned, and Janet hadn't hesitated to make the sacrifice herself.

"Oh, Steve," Peggy said shakily. "You should have heard Hank when he called. He wasn't even crying, but he just sounded... _broken_."

"I know," Steve said quietly. "He was in shock." He'd seen it many times before in his therapy sessions. And although he had long ago grown accustomed to seeing people in the most extreme forms of grief, and even though he had known that this day would come, he felt his eyes threatening to overflow. As far as anyone else knew, Janet was gone forever. She would not return for long decades. Not until Hank was an old man. Janet would become a woman out of time, doomed to the same fate as Steve himself.

Steve took a deep breath and let it out, permitting the grief to wash through him. His eyes fell on Samantha as she earnestly searched for a place to put the next puzzle piece. She was 8 years old, only a few months older than Hope. If Sammy had to face something like that... her father _was_ a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. Suddenly Steve felt a spurt of real fear. He didn't know Mike's future. What if something like that _did_ happen to their family? What if one day he got a call like this about his own son?

"I sent Hank over to see you, now that he's been debriefed," Peggy was saying over the phone, her voice clearer now. "He'll need you, both as a friend and a counselor."

"That's a good idea," Steve said, clearing this throat roughly. "And Peggy... I'm so sorry."

His daughter-in-law Tien came back upstairs just then, and Steve quickly explained what was happening. She went into the kitchen to wash the paint off her hands while Steve watched through the front window for Hank's arrival. He saw a S.H.I.E.L.D. car pull up to the curb and two agents got out of the front of the car, the younger one holding an umbrella overhead as he opened the back door for Hank. The three of them came down the sidewalk, and suddenly Steve's eyes went wide. He hurried back into the kitchen.

"Tien, I need you to answer the door," he said quickly.

"Me? Why?" she asked, frowning as she dried off her hands and glanced down self-consciously at her grubby paint clothes.

"I can't let those agents see me," he said briefly.

She didn't question him any further, but nodded seriously and went to answer the knock at the door while Steve slipped partway down the basement stairs. Tien knew the importance of Steve keeping his distance from certain people at S.H.I.E.L.D. He hadn't anticipated a problem today, but of all the people to accompany Hank Pym here...

He heard the front door open.

"We're looking for Grant Buchanan," he heard a familiar deep voice say.

"Badges, please," Tien said levelly. Mike had taught her S.H.I.E.L.D. procedures well, and after everything she had seen in Vietnam, she had a healthy dose of caution when it came to her home and her family. It was a good attitude to have, considering her husband's profession, and Steve was glad to see it.

There was a long pause as Tien checked their badges.

"Agent Fury," he heard her say at last, "and Agent Coulson. Thank you. Yes, Mr. Buchanan's here. Dr. Pym, isn't it? Come on in. I'll take you to him."

"Dr. Pym?" he heard Coulson say. "Give us a call whenever you're ready to leave. We can arrange transportation for you back to San Francisco." He sounded impossibly young, and Steve's heart was seized with a pang of regret that he couldn't have answered the door himself, and spoken to Coulson just one more time. He heard the front door shut, and a few moments later came the slam of car doors outside. Steve waited until the sound of the engine faded into the distance, just to be safe, and then he emerged from the stairwell to greet Hank.

Hank was standing at the threshold of the kitchen, wearing civilian clothing and sporting a deep cut curving around one eye. It had been cleaned up and stitched closed. He was staring at Steve's granddaughter, Sammy, like he was seeing a ghost, not even noticing Tien asking him politely if he would like something to drink.

"Hank?" Steve said. "It's Grant."

Blinking several times, Hank turned to look at him, but his eyes were watery and distant.

"I heard what happened," Steve said gently. "I'm so sorry."

Hank's lips curved downward, and he silently nodded in acknowledgement. Steve's heart went out to him. He knew something of what Hank was feeling, all too well. What is there to say when you've just lost half your soul?

"Come on. Let's go downstairs," Steve said, putting an arm around Hank and guiding him to the stairs and away from the noise of the children.

Once they were alone in the quiet of the basement, Steve went through his well-practiced grief counselor routine. Hank was too much in shock to want to do much talking, though, and Steve didn't push him. The important thing right now was to simply let Hank know that he wasn't alone, and that support was available to him when he was ready for it. He sat with Hank for hours, as the sun slipped down over the horizon and the sky grew dark outside, talking when Hank seemed to want it, and remaining silent when Hank seemed to want that.

Eventually, though, Steve thought of a practical matter that probably needed to be seen to.

"Who is with Hope?" he asked Hank.

Hank didn't answer. His eyes were fixed on the wall at the moment, looking at nothing in particular.

"Hank?" Steve prompted him after a long moment. "Who is with Hope right now?"

Finally Hank seemed to hear him. "Uhhh..." He cleared his throat and closed his eyes, thinking for a long moment. "I think... Rose? Our neighbor. That's who Janet usually..." He trailed off.

"Do you have her phone number?" Steve prompted. "We need to call her to let her know what's happened. Peggy said no one answered the phone at your house when she called earlier. Maybe Rose took Hope to her house."

Hank patted his pockets in an absent-minded kind of way, and finally managed to come up with a slim address book. He flipped through the pages, but before he had reached the end his fingers slowly stopped moving, and he sat there with the pages slipping out of his grip, eyes going vague and unfocused.

"Here, let me," Steve said, gently taking the address book out of his hands. Hank sat there and silently watched him flip through until he found the phone number for Rose.

Just then Steve heard the front door upstairs slam shut, and through the walls he could hear Peggy's voice greeting Tien and the kids. Relieved that she was here, he put his hand on Hank's shoulder. "I'll be right back, Hank. Why don't you try lying down? You look exhausted."

He didn't get a response. Hank had resumed staring at the wall.

Steve hurried upstairs, where Peggy greeted him with an unusually fierce hug. "How is Hank?" she asked after she released him, her face anxious.

"Nearly catatonic," Steve said. "Tien, do you have any sleep aids in your medicine cabinet? I think he's going to need some help getting rest tonight."

"Stay the night?" Peggy said, looking alarmed. "But Hope is in San Francisco. He needs to go home to her. She doesn't know what's happened yet."

"Hank's in no state to be going anywhere," Steve said. "And he's not going to be able to deliver that news to Hope, not without scaring her even worse than she's already going to be. He's just going to have to stay here until he's recovered from the shock."

He gave Peggy the phone number of Hope's caretaker, and Peggy went into the next room to make the phone call. She was there for a long time, and when she came back she said that she had explained the situation to Rose, who said she would try to rearrange her schedule to stay with Hope until Hank was able to return.

"She won't tell Hope anything about the accident," Peggy said. "I don't think a child needs to hear news like that from a stranger, particularly when we don't know how long it will be before Hank can go home to be with her."

"What did you tell the neighbor?" Tien asked, putting an arm around Peggy's shoulders and giving her a comforting squeeze. "About the accident?"

Peggy sighed deeply. "I said it was a plane crash, God forgive me." She looked around at them soberly. "Janet died saving millions of lives. But that can't ever be publicly known. Only those of us at S.H.I.E.L.D. will ever know what she did."

* * *

Hank ended up staying at Mike's house for more than a week before Steve judged him well enough to go home. He wasn't exactly back to normal even now, but Rose had now been watching Hope for two full weeks, counting the days the Pyms had been carrying out their mission, and together Steve's family agreed that it shouldn't continue any further. Ready or not, Hank needed to go home now.

Steve and Peggy helped Hank pack up his few belongings and explained to him everything he needed to know about his travel plans.

"And Hank?" Peggy said. "After you get home, I want you to pack up your things, and Hope's things, and whatever you need from your lab, and I want you to move here to Washington, D.C."

"I'm not putting my lab in the Triskelion," Hank said, showing a spurt of anger for the first time. "How many times do I have to say it? My technology is _dangerous_. I think that's been demonstrated in a pretty spectacular way in recent days, hasn't it?" His tone was harsh, although he seemed to be on the verge of tears.

"Then don't move into the Triskelion," Peggy said calmly. "Find an office space here in D.C. that you can rent out, and set up shop there. I don't want you living alone with Hope all the way down in San Francisco, Hank. School is out for the summer and she'll need someone to look after her all day while you're at work."

"My neighbor, Rose-" Hank began.

"I spoke to her, remember?" Peggy said. "She isn't available to be a full-time nanny for you. You would have to leave Hope with strangers, and she needs something better than that right now." She spoke kindly, but there was a hint of steel in her tone, too. She had anticipated Hank's objections, but she had also made up her mind about what was best, and she wasn't going to back down easily.

"I don't know anyone here," Hank said.

"You know _us_," Peggy said. "Our son is looking to rent out this basement right now." She gestured around them. "You and Hope can stay here. My daughter-in-law can look after her while you're working. There will be other children her age to play with all summer. It will be good for her. And it would be better for you, too, Hank. You shouldn't be alone right now."

Hank didn't seem to have the heart to argue. A few weeks later, after Janet's memorial service was over and all the arrangements had been made, he and Hope moved into Mike and Tien's basement apartment with the intention of staying for at least the summer. He didn't sell his home or his lab in San Francisco; he obviously intended to go back. But for now, he seemed grateful for the help they were offering for Hope's sake.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** What did you think? Leave a review and let me know!_


	11. Chapter 11

_**Author's note: **Thank you to FictionFrek101, Jedi Alex Colbent, Pirate King Ray and the many "Guests" who have left reviews! (To the last Guest who commented, that sounds like a great idea for a fic! Sounds like you disliked a few things in that episode that I did, too. :-) That probably isn't a project I could tackle right away, at least not until I finish my Avengers stories. Do you write at all? Maybe you could try your hand?.)_

* * *

**1989**

Steve did his best to help Hank cope with his grief, coming over to Mike's house on a daily basis to check in on him. But even now that the shock of his wife's death had worn off, Hank did not seem particularly interested in being helped. He would listen to Steve's gentle advice with patient silence, and then calmly ignore it. He wouldn't argue or rage with Steve or anyone else about anything, although before Janet's death he had sometimes had a bit of a temper. Nowadays he seemed to be only half awake. Or half alive.

Nor did Hank seem interested in helping Hope. He spent very long hours working in his lab, leaving first thing in the morning and frequently not coming back until after Hope was already in bed. It was painful and frustrating for Steve to see his friend in pain - and even more so to see Hope confused and hurt by her father's distance - but he'd been doing grief counseling long enough to know that it wasn't possible to force someone to accept help. Whenever Hank was ready to heal, Steve would be there for him. Until then, there wasn't much else they could do.

"Is this what it was like for you?" Peggy asked Steve one night as they got ready for bed while discussing Hank's apparent lack of progress. "When they took you out of the ice?"

He was cautious with his answer. Peggy inevitably grew distressed at any discussion of that time period, although Steve had tried not to get too detailed with her about how difficult it had been for him. But she knew him too well, and there was no getting around it: his first few months in the future had been unquestionably traumatic, and Peggy hated the fact that she hadn't been there for him. It was almost like she thought she could make up for it now by sharing in Steve's grief, although he had long ago put it behind him.

"I swung between anger and numbness," he finally told her. "Hank seems to stay almost exclusively numb. It's understandable; it can actually be a relief to feel nothing for a while. But it's hard on Hope. She doesn't understand what's wrong with her dad."

"Maybe it's Hope you need to be working with," Peggy said slowly. "If Hank won't respond..."

"I hate to interfere with someone else's parenting."

"_Someone_ has to parent her," Peggy said. "And if he won't, then our family _will_."

Steve made sure to ask permission first, but Hank didn't object to the idea of Hope talking to him as a therapist and not just as a family friend. In fact, he looked relieved when Steve suggested it. It was one more thing he didn't have to worry about himself.

And so Steve began making it a point to talk to Hope in private on a regular basis, asking her how she was doing, encouraging her to talk about things that were bothering her. It didn't take long to gain her trust, and it quickly became clear that Hope was _not_ numb about her mother's death, or her father's emotional absence either, for that matter.

She was _furious_.

Steve's talks with her tended to take on the tenor of a barely-controlled venting session, but he could handle Hope's anger. It became his job to remain calm and to assure her as many times as she needed to hear it: "Your father loves you more than you know."

"Then how come he's never _here?_" Hope shouted one day. Angry tears streamed down her face, her hands balled into fists at her side. "Even when he's here he isn't here!"

"I know," Steve said soothingly. "It's how people grieve, Hope. Sometimes the pain is so hard to bear that people just want to run away from it. Sometimes they throw themselves into their work so they don't have to think about things for a while. What do you want to do when you feel bad about your mother?"

Hope sniffed angrily. "I want to _hit_ something!"

Steve paused a moment. "Well, there's a punching bag downstairs. Do you want me to teach you how to use it?"

"Is that... okay?" she asked, looking so surprised at the suggestion that she forgot to be angry for a second. She couldn't have been ignorant of the fact that both her mother and her father knew hand-to-hand combat, could she? Maybe she was. Maybe she had believed them to be scientists only. It had taken Hank a long time to come around to the idea of teaching Janet to fight in the first place.

"Hitting a punching bag is just exactly what I used to do when I felt bad about losing somebody I cared about very much," Steve said to Hope gently. "It's okay. Do you want to try?"

Hope nodded vigorously, smearing at the tears on her cheeks with the palms of her hands.

"Okay." He stood up. "Let's go. I'll teach you the right way to punch."

Hope took to the lessons eagerly. At first she was undisciplined, striking out in anger as hard as she possibly could, too impatient for grace or precision. But as the summer wore on, he was gradually able to coax her into focusing her anger in more constructive ways, and she eventually discovered that she had better control when she did. His granddaughter Sammy often joined them, helping him show Hope how it was done; Mike had been teaching all his children his own fighting style from an early age, a blend of what Steve had taught Mike as a young man and the Vo Binh Dihn Mike had subsequently learned during his time in Vietnam. Before long, Hope had moved on to learning kicks, and then Steve had her begin punching and kicking his hands rather than the punching bag. The first time they did that, she was timid, pulling her punches and no longer throwing all her weight behind her kicks like she should.

"Hope, honey," he said gently. "You can't hurt me. You can hit as hard as you want."

He was afraid she wouldn't believe him, given his age - she had taken to calling him Grandpa, like all the other kids in the house did - but to his surprise, she took him at his word. She threw herself into it, holding nothing back, but still keeping a tight control over her aim, and she launched a volley of relentless attacks until finally she had had enough and stood there panting, looking pleased with herself. Steve couldn't help but smile.

"You're a natural," he told her.

A flush of pride touched her cheeks.

"I think maybe we should show your dad what you can do. What do you think?"

Hope nodded eagerly.

They had to wait until Hank came home from work late that night. He walked down the stairs to the basement and paused in surprise when he saw Steve and Hope waiting there for him. His tie was loosened, his suit jacket rumpled, and there were papers nearly bursting out of his overstuffed briefcase.

"What's this?" he asked blankly.

Steve stood up. "Hope has something to show you," he said. "She's been working hard on this."

Hope began to demonstrate the moves she had learned, one by one, and when she was finished she turned to look at her dad, her expression hopeful.

Hank had watched it all in silence, just standing there holding his briefcase.

"That's not bad," he said finally.

Hope's shoulders sagged visibly in relief. Clearly she had feared her father would have nothing to say about her newfound skills. Steve was more than a little relieved too; he had feared the same thing.

"Hope, why don't you go get ready for bed?" Steve said. "It's late." She ran off, glancing one more time at her dad as she went.

"She's a little young for that, isn't she?" Hank asked Steve when she was gone.

"Not at all," Steve said. "She's handling it well. I think she's about ready to learn throws. And Hank... I think you should take over as her teacher."

"Me?" Hank said blankly. "I don't have time for all that. My work-"

"You can't work 24/7, Hank," Steve said firmly. "Get out your lab for an hour or so every day and do this for Hope. It would be good for you, and it would be good for her, too. She wants to spend time with you."

"It's just that I'm trying to figure out all _this_," Hank said, gesturing vaguely toward his briefcase. "I've barely even tapped the surface of the Quantum Realm. My experiments are _important_. I don't have time for playing around."

"I know what it is you're trying to do, Hank," Steve said gently. "And you're right, your experiments _are_ important. You can do that and be there for Hope, too. Just an hour a day. It would mean a lot to her. It might even help you work more effectively if you take a break once in a while."

"I'll... think about it," Hank said, but already he seemed to be half-asleep again. He started toward his bedroom.

"Hank," Steve said, and Hank turned back for a moment.

"It's important to Hope," Steve said.

Hank nodded silently, and disappeared into his bedroom.

But despite Steve's best efforts, he never could get Hank to take over as Hope's teacher. The school year started, and Peggy convinced Hank to continue to stay in D.C. a little longer and let Hope go to school with their grandchildren. Steve continued Hope's martial arts lessons himself, and before long she was learning throws, partnered with Sammy. He taught her some of Natasha Romanoff's old favorites, which gave him a bittersweet kind of satisfaction, and she took to them like a fish to water, not holding back in the slightest. Steve wondered uneasily sometimes what was going to happen if Hope ever sparred with someone other than members of his family. All of them were unusually... resilient, even his grandchildren. Hope was going to be a force to reckon with when she found herself facing off against a normal person.

January came, and Steve was working with Hope in the basement gym one afternoon when he heard the front door burst open and someone came clomping down the stairs loudly. He and Hope paused in surprise to see Hank swiftly stride into the room. School had only just gotten out, and he never came home that early.

It was obvious from Hank's reddened face that he was absolutely livid about something. He pointed at Hope and snapped: "Get your things. All of them. Just throw them in a bag as fast as you can. We're leaving."

"Why?" she demanded, immediately responding with a flare of her own anger, but Hank barked, "_Now_," and Hope, wide-eyed and taken aback, ran to obey. Ignoring Steve, Hank strode into his bedroom and yanked a suitcase out from under the bed.

"Hank?" Steve asked, concerned, coming to stand at the threshold of his room.

Just then, Peggy also came down into the basement, heels clicking rapidly across the floor until she joined them.

"Hank, don't do this," she said sharply. "Please. I know you're angry, and you have a right to be, but I can make this right for you."

"It's too late," Hank told Peggy roughly, opening a drawer and pulling out a fistful of clothing. "I don't blame you for what happened. But you couldn't exactly stop it either, could you?"

"I swear to you, Mitchell Carson has worked his last day at S.H.I.E.L.D.," Peggy said fiercely. "I'm letting him go, first thing in the morning."

Hank paused, fixing an intense blue gaze at Peggy. "And what about Howard Stark? Are you going to fire him, too?"

Peggy drew back a little, hesitating, and Hank scoffed loudly, returning to shoveling things into his suitcase.

"What's happened?" Steve asked.

Hank laughed cynically. "Go on," he said to Peggy. "Tell him."

Peggy tipped her head back for a moment and looked up at the ceiling for a moment, as if appealing to heaven for help. "Mitchell Carson tried to replicate the Pym Particles in the defense lab. I never authorized him to do that."

"And?" Hank prompted her angrily.

Peggy sighed. "And Howard Stark was helping him."

"Never should have trusted a _Stark_," Hank growled, crumpling up a suit and stuffing it into a corner of the suitcase.

"Hank, please, stop and think for a moment," Peggy urged. "You can't continue your research alone; you need S.H.I.E.L.D.'s resources. I can enact whatever precautions you think are necessary, but-"

"There's nothing to think about," Hank snapped. "It's over. Decision's made. I'm going back to San Francisco."

"What about Hope?" Peggy demanded. "How are you going to care for her? You spend all day, every day in the lab... Be realistic, Hank, you're not even _close_ to a breakthrough on the Quantum Realm!"

"That's why they invented boarding schools," Hank said.

"_Please_ don't do that," Peggy said pleadingly. "Hope should be here, in a family setting. And you know how much she loves training with Grant, don't take that away from-"

"Believe it or not, they have martial arts instructors in San Francisco, too," Hank interrupted. He paused for a moment, and then said a little more gently, "I'm grateful for everything your family has done for Hope. But I don't want my lab within a thousand miles of S.H.I.E.L.D."

"What about Ant-Man?" Peggy said in disbelief. "How do you expect to do all that on your own?"

"I'm hanging up the suit," Hank said. "As of this moment, Ant-Man is retired. I'll finally be able to devote all my attention to my research again."

Peggy looked shocked. "But-"

"It was going to happen anyway," Hank said. "All those years of exposure to the particles, it took a toll on my body. You know that. It's time. Probably past time."

"Then you have a responsibility to find someone to take your place," Peggy said firmly.

"No!" Hank slammed his suitcase shut, his temper flaring again. "As long as I'm alive, _nobody_ is going to get access to my formula!"

"How many lives did you save as Ant-Man?" Peggy demanded. "We _need_ him... the world needs him! You can't just quit without naming a successor. Grant, tell him!"

"The Pym Particles aren't a tool, or even a weapon, to be handed off to the next runner like a baton in a race," Steve said quietly. "They have the potential to change the texture of reality. There's a lot of scope for abuse, and we don't know who at S.H.I.E.L.D. can or can't be trusted." He met Hank's eyes. "In the end, the safest hands are your own."

"_Thank_ you!" Hank spread his hands meaningfully. "Finally, someone who understands!" He picked up his bags and strode up the stairs, barking at Hope to grab her bags and bring them out to the car.

Peggy leveled a furious look at Steve. "Yes, thank you _so_ much for that," she said tightly.

Upstairs, they could hear Hope crying and arguing as Hank ushered her out the front door, while their grandchildren burst out with a chorus of confused questions and more than a few tears of their own. A few moments later, they heard car doors slam, the engine started, and then tires squealed as Hank's car pulled away from the curb and zoomed away. The two of them were left alone in a suddenly-quiet basement.

"You knew that was going to happen!" Peggy burst out, fixing an accusatory look at Steve.

"I knew he was going to leave for some reason," Steve said, "and that whatever it was, he blamed Howard for it. I didn't know Mitchell Carson was involved, too."

"Well, why didn't you-" Peggy started angrily, and then quickly bit off the words. She took a couple of calming breaths. "I suppose this is one of those things I asked you not to tell me," she said at last.

"You did say you didn't want to know the future of your career or Hank's. I hope I didn't misunderstand your wishes."

Peggy shook her head. "It doesn't matter," she said, although there was a hint of bitterness in her tone. "I couldn't have changed this any more than I could save Janet, could I? I've just lost my best operative, and there's nothing more to be said about it."

Steve put a hand on her shoulder. "I know it's hard to see Hank leave S.H.I.E.L.D. like this," he said gently, "but it isn't as disastrous as you think it is."

"Oh, don't you _dare_ tell me that everything is working out like it should according to some great master plan," Peggy said furiously, getting up to pace the floor. "You can't seriously think that will make me feel any better about what just happened."

Steve sighed, and held his tongue.

"Well?" Peggy demanded.

"You just told me I couldn't say what I was about to say," Steve pointed out.

Peggy looked at him for a long moment, and finally her shoulders sagged. She sank down onto the bed, looking utterly defeated.

"I'm sorry, Steve," she said. "It's just... I've completely lost control of my own agency."

He sat down beside her and took her hand in his. "Control is an illusion," he responded. "In the end, all you can control is yourself."

"Did I compromise too much?" Peggy asked herself softly, eyes distant. "Did I let the monster in?"

"You compromised where you could," Steve reminded her. "And where you couldn't, you didn't. You stood firm. Just because one man-"

"It wasn't one man," Peggy said flatly. "It was an entire lab full of men and women, working on a project that I never approved, using S.H.I.E.L.D. resources under the direction of two of my top people. That's completely out of bounds, and I won't stand for it." Her tone grew fierce. "It ends here and now. I am going to search every nook and cranny until I find every single bad actor in every department of my agency, and I am going to purge them from S.H.I.E.L.D. It's time for a house-cleaning."

Steve felt a surge of pride. That was the Peggy he knew and loved. Her hair was now liberally streaked with gray, but she still carried so much strength and beauty inside her that at times he still wondered how he had gotten so lucky as to share a life with her.

"Now," Peggy continued more quietly, squeezing Steve's hand. "Tell me why it isn't so bad that I just lost Hank Pym."

Taking a deep breath, he began to tell her everything he knew about Hank's future. About Pym Laboratories and the fortune Hank made with his inventions there, although his Ant-Man suit and his particles remained locked away, unused. About his estrangement from Hope and his expulsion from his own company, followed by his belated but welcome choice of a worthy successor in Scott Lang. How he and Hope had eventually reconciled. And finally, he told her about the Quantum Tunnel Hank was able to build after more than 20 years of researching the Quantum Realm.

"He used the Quantum Tunnel to bring Janet back to him," Steve explained softly. "The Avengers adapted it to travel through time to collect the Infinity Stones. And I used it to come back to you. Without it..."

Peggy drew in a slow breath. "All right. You've made your point. As far as mitigating circumstances go, that isn't bad."

Just then they heard the thump of the front door upstairs, and a few moments later Mike jogged down the stairs. He looked at them both and said tersely: "We have a serious problem."

Peggy stood to face him. "Did you get anything out of Dr. Greiling?"

"Dr. Greiling?" Steve asked.

"She worked under Mitchell Carson at the defense lab," Peggy quickly explained. "I asked Mike to question her, find out if she and her team knew they were acting without my authorization when they were trying to replicate the Pym Particles, or if Carson lied to them, too." She glanced back at Mike. "What did she say?"

"Nothing," Mike said.

Peggy paused. "She refused to answer?" she said with some surprise.

"It's not that," Mike said. "She's dead."

"_Dead_?" Peggy repeated in disbelief. "How?"

"Killed herself."

"What?" Peggy stared at him. "Are you certain?"

"Pretty certain. I watched her do it."

"Are you saying," Peggy said, eyes wide, "that you pulled Dr. Greiling aside to accuse her of industrial espionage, and her immediate response was to _kill_ herself right in front of you?"

Mike was pale. "You _did_ tell me to put the pressure on her..."

Peggy's eyes darted around his face. "Well, what did you say to her? _Exactly_?"

Mike sighed, looking troubled. "I just said something like, 'we know what you've been doing, we know whose orders you're taking, and I'm not going to leave until you give me the names of everyone involved.' And then she popped a false tooth out of her mouth, bit it, and died."

"_What_?" Peggy said sharply, and Steve felt a sudden jolt go through him. Peggy stared at their son, confusion written all over her face. "But... that's a Hydra trick!"

Steve found himself breathing quickly, his mind racing along a new and unexpected track. In the future, Hank Pym had been so bitter toward the Starks that he had assumed the falling-out with S.H.I.E.L.D. had come down to Howard's greed. Howard did have a long history of "borrowing" other inventors' ideas and presenting them as if they were all his own, a distressing tendency that had always puzzled Peggy and Steve because he certainly had no shortage of his own genius.

"Dr. Greiling thought you meant something else," Steve said to Mike, the truth sinking in like a revelation. "She thought you knew more than you actually did."

"You mean Dr. Greiling is _Hydra_?" Peggy demanded. "And Mitchell Carson? Steve, why on earth didn't you _say_ something? You warned me about Zola!"

"I didn't _know_," Steve said, feeling more than a little unsettled himself. "Hank spent his whole life hating _Howard_ over this." Mentally, he kicked himself for being so complacent, for thinking that just because he knew some of the future, he therefore knew everything important. He'd been working around a blind spot all this time, he just hadn't known it. But of course Hydra would have wanted to get their hands on Hank's formula, and they'd manipulated Howard's greed toward that end. A chill shot through Steve, thinking of how close they had gotten.

"Heaven help us," Peggy said, looking stunned. "How did we let this slip past us? I thought we had an eye on all the Hydra operatives. We never pegged Carson as a threat. Mike-"

"We've kept an eye on _everyone_ since Zola died," Mike said vehemently. "Me and my team. Including Carson and Greiling. We checked up on them." He shook his head, looking furious with himself. "We missed it. We must have been blind."

"I was blind, too," Peggy admitted. "I've been working with Carson for years. I have to give Hydra credit, they seem to be getting more slippery as time goes on." She set her jaw and inhaled deeply through her nose, moving past her shock and replacing it with rock-solid determination in a well-practiced maneuver.

"Well, what are we going to do about it?" she said to them both. "How are we going to fix this?"

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note: **I'd love to know what you think!_


	12. Chapter 12

**1990**

Mitchell Carson never came back to work, nor did a handful of the scientists who had been working in the defense lab to replicate Hank Pym's particles. They'd obviously been tipped off by the death of Dr. Greiling that their cover was blown, and even their homes had been cleared out overnight, leaving no obvious traces of where they had gone. Still, Peggy set Mike at the head of a carefully selected team of agents — only those she was absolutely certain she could trust — to tracking them down. The only thing worse than a Hydra agent buried inside S.H.I.E.L.D. was a Hydra agent working freelance, away from their watchful eyes.

It was delicate, dangerous work, made all the more complicated by the fact that Peggy had to hide these activities from the Council itself; it was too soon for them to know of Hydra's existence.

And if that weren't enough, Peggy delayed her retirement and began to personally conduct a quiet but intensive audit of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s internal affairs. They knew they could not assume that all the rats had fled the ship; there were bound to be Hydra agents infiltrating other departments who had somehow escaped their notice, as Carson had.

Slowly, their investigations began to bear fruit. Mike and his team caught one scientist in Beirut. Another in Wellington. A third in Guangzhou. Each success yielded more information that helped lead them to the next. But Carson himself remained elusive.

Meanwhile, Peggy was making inroads in cleaning out the defense lab. The Hydra agents may have fled, but there was still work to be done. For the willfully clueless who seemed to have assisted Carson, perhaps unwittingly, there were demotions and downgrading of security clearances. Transfers to less crucial departments. Increased oversight by people Peggy trusted. And, most painful of all, she had revoked Howard Stark's access to the defense lab.

He'd been, predictably, furious. He'd accused Peggy of overreacting, of making him into a scapegoat for Carson's misdeeds. It had sickened Peggy to do it — despite the many times the two of them had butted heads over the years, she nevertheless considered Howard a friend — but she felt she had no choice.

"Being ignorant of Carson's intentions is no excuse," Peggy told Steve wearily. "The end result was the same; Howard helped Hydra. The fact of the matter is, I can't trust him anymore. He may mean well, but if they used him before, they could use him again. They know his weaknesses now."

* * *

Weeks stretched into months, and Peggy's mission to purge S.H.I.E.L.D. hit a dead end.

"There's something rotten going on around Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S., but I can't seem to pin anyone down," she told Steve one night.

She spread her papers out over the kitchen table and together they went over everything she had discovered. Most alarming were the discrepancies in various reports regarding the times and dates that the Tesseract was being put into use for its various energy experiments; it was clear that some of the technicians, at least, were not being honest about what they were doing with it.

Both Steve and Peggy had to fight their instinctive urge to remove the Tesseract in secret from the S.H.I.E.L.D. facility where it was being kept and store it somewhere only their family would know; if Hydra had infiltrated Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S., such a drastic move would tip them off, and then Mike and his team would have to chase yet another wave of fleeing Hydra agents around the globe. Better to take them as a group, unaware, if they could.

And so Peggy devised a wilier plan, using a scrap of information Natasha Romanoff had picked up from Carol Danvers during the years they had worked together post-Snap, which Nat had once mentioned to Steve. Steve hated working on third-hand information like that — hadn't that already gotten them into trouble? — but it was the best they could come up with.

It didn't take them long to find Dr. Wendy Lawson, freshly recruited by the U.S. Air Force to explore the potential for interstellar travel and actively searching for a powerful energy source that would work with her designs. Peggy immediately arranged for a meeting, which Dr. Lawson was all too eager to agree to, explaining to Peggy the moment she walked through the door that she had been trying for a month to arrange the meeting herself, but had been rebuffed by S.H.I.E.L.D.'s gatekeepers.

What followed was, as Peggy described it to Steve afterward, one of the most ludicrous conversations she had ever participated in, as Dr. Lawson earnestly strove to convince Peggy, step by step, that interstellar space travel might be possible, and if only Director Carter had come across any unusual energy sources during her time at S.H.I.E.L.D., and would be willing to simply lend it to the project for a time...

Peggy sank down on the couch next to Steve as soon as she got home, explaining with an expressive sweep of her arms: "There we were, two venerable ladies of a certain age, one of us human, one of us pretending to be, both of us knowing perfectly well that interstellar space travel is_ already happening_-" Steve fought back an audible smile, not wanting to interrupt her story.

"-and then her pretending she doesn't already know about the existence of the Tesseract," Peggy went on, "and me pretending I haven't already decided to hand it over to her, and putting on a big show of being reluctant-" Peggy dissolved into laughter, a sound that had grown all too rare during this period of Hydra-hunting. "Oh, Steve, I could hardly keep a straight face!"

"So when is the transfer?" Steve asked.

"I'm going to hand it over to Dr. Lawson in four days. That should be enough time to disconnect the Tesseract from the hardware and arrange for transportation," Peggy said. She took in a deep breath and let it out, the smile slowly fading from her face. "And Howard is already furious with me. I can just imagine what he's going to say when he finds out I'm taking the Tesseract from him and giving it to another researcher."

"He hasn't made any headway with it in a long time," Steve said. "And he has plenty of other projects in his own company to occupy his time."

"I know," Peggy said. "But he thinks of the Tesseract as his. He _was_ the one who fished it out of the ocean."

"Yeah, well, once he's gone through as much as I have trying to keep that thing out of the wrong hands, then I might think about letting him have a say."

Steve couldn't quite keep a hint of bitterness from creeping in. Of all the Stones, the Tesseract was the one that had weighed on him the heaviest. He'd had to fight not one, not two, but _three_ power-hungry tyrants to stop them from misusing it, and to add insult to injury, images of the Tesseract had figured heavily in his post-traumatic flashbacks in the months immediately following his revival from the ice; he knew he wasn't fully capable of being objective about it anymore.

* * *

The day arrived. Peggy headed to work to oversee the transfer, and Steve ended up going over to Sarah's house, mostly to distract himself from thinking about the Tesseract.

There was always something going on at Sarah's house, and today was no different; when Steve pulled up in his Jeep, her three youngest children were out in the driveway, drawing on the concrete with sidewalk chalk. Fourteen-year-old Maggie was sitting back in a lawn chair under the willow tree with sunglasses perched on top of her head and a magazine resting in her lap, which she was ignoring in favor of actively supervising the other three kids. She had always thrived on being put in charge, which suited Dave and Sarah just fine: while Bram was the oldest and had always been pretty responsible, taking care of his younger siblings was not his favorite thing to do.

Steven, Amanda and Joe were all fully absorbed in their chalk art, but when they saw Steve coming, they dropped everything and ran to mob him with hugs that left chalky handprints all over his shirt. Steve had learned long ago to stop being bothered by things like that — in fact, it tended to give him a wistful kind of regret that his own children had grown up far too quickly — and he spent the requisite amount of time admiring their artwork before going over to where Maggie was sitting. He put a hand on her shoulder, and she reached back and put her hand on top of his, tipping her head back and smiling up at him.

"Hey, kiddo," Steve said.

"Hi, Grandpa."

"Where's your mom and dad?"

"Dad's working in the lab in the back," Amanda answered before Maggie could — despite being next-to-youngest she tended to do most of the talking for the other children, and it was a running joke in the family that she had really been intended for Mike's family but had ended up in Sarah's by mistake — "and Mom's working there, too, and Bram's helping her."

"How come they never let us help?" Joe asked grumpily as he scribbled on the concrete with a piece of green chalk. It looked like he was drawing alligators. Or maybe dinosaurs? No, definitely alligators.

Maggie opened her mouth to answer, but Amanda interrupted. "Bram gets to help because he's in the Captain America Club!" she said.

"So is Maggie, and she never helps in the lab!" Joe shot back.

"I'm watching you three," Maggie said, settling back more comfortably in the lawn chair. "That's _my_ job in the club."

Steven had already become reabsorbed in his drawing, silently adding broad strokes to a well-executed figure in armor riding a horse and shutting out the squabble with the skill of someone who had been doing it for a lifetime. But Amanda looked discontented, holding her piece of chalk but not using it.

"Grandpa, can't I join the club?" she asked pleadingly.

"You sure can. In a few years."

"Can't I join _early_?"

"Amanda, no one joins until they're 13," Maggie said with a touch of impatience. "That's why Harrison was the last to join. It's just him and Natty in their family, and me and Bram in ours. You have to wait your turn like we did. Steven's next, not you."

"He doesn't even care about the club!" Amanda objected.

"Yes, I do," Steven said quietly, although he was still concentrating on his art and to all appearances hadn't been paying attention to the conversation. "The Captain America Club isn't the kind where you meet in a treehouse to play games and eat cookies, Amanda. It's a grown-up thing. Can't you see that?"

"You don't even know!"

"Anyone who's paying attention could guess that much," Steven said, although his tone toward his sister was mild and not accusatory. He seemed so certain of himself that Steve wondered briefly if he had already noticed something different, about his older siblings or maybe even himself. He was 12 years old; it wasn't too soon for some of the changes, and Steven had always been more observant than most, spending more time watching and listening than talking.

"Are _you_ in the Captain America Club?" Joe asked Steve, and then he pointed at Steve's shirt pocket with a second, silent question in his eyes — he knew perfectly well that was where the butterscotch candies were kept.

"Not only am I in the club, but I am one of the founding members," Steve told them as he fished out four candies and passed them around. "Me and Grandma Peggy." He skirted around the chalk art carefully so he wouldn't scuff it. "I'm going to go back and talk to your parents. Maggie, have you got everything under control here?"

"Yep."

"Okay. Come and get me if you need anything; don't bother your parents while they're working."

"I know."

Steve went through the gate to the backyard and headed for the shed — which looked like a sizable, comfortable place to do wood-working projects, at least from the outside. He typed the code into the keypad and waited to hear the lock release before opening the door and walking into the cool interior.

At first it looked like Dave was the only one in the room, perched on a stool pulled up to one of the long stretches of lab counters, which were well-sanitized and scattered with the various tools of his and Sarah's trade — microscopes and centrifuges and computers and medical refrigerators. Dave was squinting at a square glass microscope slide as he carefully used a dropper to add a drop of blue liquid from a vial, but he looked up when Steve walked in and nodded to him in greeting.

"Is that the new strain?" Steve asked curiously, coming over to see.

"Yes. Osteo-3. I just added it to a sample of my own hematopoietic stem cells. Want to see?" Dave clipped the slide into place, and Steve leaned over the microscope and looked in.

"The cells are transforming," Steve murmured.

"Yeah, it works all right," Dave said, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes. "On a cellular level, anyway. It's the animal testing where it all falls apart, just like with Cardio-5 and all the variants that came before."

"Obviously you're doing something right," Steve said.

"And obviously, I'm doing something wrong too." Dave didn't sound frustrated, though, just a little tired. He had the tenacity of a bulldog and the patience of Job, even if he didn't make a big show of it. After he and Sarah had hit a wall with the cardiovascular strain they had first developed, he'd simply shrugged his shoulders and started working on the strain of the serum that affected the bones. Whenever and however the two of them managed to fix the stability problem, they'd have a good head start on two medicines now instead of just one.

"Did Sarah tell you? We're going to have Bram be a lab assistant and help with the testing phase of this variant," Dave said, replacing his glasses and peering down into the microscope to take a look at the sample himself.

"He's ready for that?"

Dave nodded. "He's pretty apt. Says he likes doing this stuff better than his schoolwork." He shot a grin at Steve. "I guess there's worse problems to have with a 16-year-old kid, right?"

"Probably," Steve agreed with a smile. "Where is he, and Sarah?"

Dave pointed to the other end of the room, where Steve could hear Billy Joel's staticky voice coming from the radio around the corner, crooning "This is the Time." He followed the music, which led him past the lab counters and around the corner to where Sarah's family had set up a little sunny nook with a couch and a mini-fridge and a TV. There, he found Sarah and Bram, kicked back on the couch with their feet up on the coffee table, reading comic books.

"I thought you were supposed to be working," Steve said mildly.

Sarah glanced up from her comic book. "I'm researching," she said defensively. "And Bram's reading his family history. He got a new issue today."

Considering the amount of information that needed to be imparted to the grandkids once they were old enough to understand, and how much of it was pretty heady stuff involving time travel, aliens and various world disasters, Sarah and Mike had agreed that for their children, they would slowly parcel out Steve's Avengers comics over the course of their teenage years, giving them a chance to get used to each revelation about the future before they burdened them with another. So far it seemed to be a good system.

"Hey, Grandpa," Bram said, glancing up long enough to scoot over to make room for Steve to sit down. His legs looked ridiculously long, stretched out on the coffee table, and as Steve settled down on the couch he found himself wondering what his grandson would look like when he reached manhood, which suddenly didn't seem all that far away.

He snuck a surreptitious look at Bram, who was intent on his new comic book, and studied his maturing face: the square jaw, the straight nose, the hair just exactly the same color as Steve's, parted and combed neatly to the side in a quiet but deliberate defiance of the fashion of this time.

Looking at him, Steve suddenly froze with recognition. In a flash he knew something he had never known before: he had _already_ seen Bram in his manhood. The pallbearer at Peggy's funeral, the man around his own age who had stood beside him as they shouldered the casket together, wearing a dark suit and blinking back a haze of tears as valiantly as Steve himself had done: That had been _Bram_. It was all Steve could do to fight the sudden rush of emotion that swept over him.

_I must have been blind,_ Steve thought, breathing quickly as he looked over Bram with new eyes. _He even looks like me._ But of course he wouldn't have noticed the similarities, or understood them if he had. At the funeral he had intentionally resisted looking any of Peggy's family in the eye, except Sharon — it had still been too painful to think of the family Peggy had had without him. And he had been dizzy with grief, not to mention distracted by the Accords; the whole day had passed by in a blur and one of his principle impressions of that day was gratitude that Sam had been there to help him get from Point A to Point B, because he'd never been thinking less clearly in his life.

Steve took in several deep breaths, permitting himself the time he needed to absorb this. This was not a discovery he could share with anyone: Peggy didn't want to know anything of her death, and he never told anything to the children or grandchildren that Peggy didn't already know. He'd had to leave Peggy's funeral out of the comic book issue Bram was currently reading for that very reason.

After a minute, when Steve had regained his equilibrium, he patted Bram's knee. "So what's new?" he asked, and he was pleased that his voice managed to sound normal.

"Oh, uh, Mom and Dad tested me on everything again yesterday," Bram answered, glancing up from his comic book again. He reached back and pulled a folded-up piece of paper out of his back pocket, looking a little shy but offering it to Steve anyway. "You want to see?"

Steve took the paper and unfolded it. On it was listed stats for speed, weight lifting, endurance, reflexes, healing factor and more, side by side with his stats from when they had first tested Bram at age 13.

"Looks like everything's gone up," Steve said, scanning through the list.

"He's now about 72 percent of what you are," Sarah put in. "That might inch up a little more once he's reached his full growth, if he's anything like me and Mike, but probably not much more."

"I'm less of a Captain America, and more of a Lieutenant America," Bram said, deadpan. He didn't look like he minded, though. He'd taken a few fighting lessons from his Uncle Mike, enough to be able to defend himself if he needed to, but like his mother his heart wasn't fully in it. By contrast, his cousin Harrison at age 13 was already shaping up to be quite the fighter.

"Notice anything interesting there, Dad?" Sarah continued, nodding at the paper.

Steve answered readily. "There was less attrition than we expected. Just like with you and Mike."

Sarah nodded. "Yeah. I think this pretty well proves Dave's hypothesis: the genes that were serum-enhanced are disproportionately dominant. Otherwise we would see the enhancements cut by 50 percent with each generation. You can see there _is_ a decline in ability, just not that much."

"So does that tell you anything useful?"

"Yeah," Sarah said, tucking back a strand of hair that had escaped her ponytail. "It says to me that after a certain number of generations we're going to lose the benefits of the serum, and Dave and I better figure out Erskine's secrets quickly, before-"

"-before I keel over and you lose my blood samples," Steve finished helpfully.

"I wasn't gonna say that, Dad," Sarah objected, smiling at Steve. "But it would definitely be nice if we figured out how to make these serum extractions from scratch, instead of spinning it out from your blood. Then we wouldn't have to jab you with needles all the time."

Bram closed the last page of "Captain America: Civil War" and sighed deeply. "Wow," he said softly.

"What did you think?" Steve asked.

"That was... a lot. I'm sorry, Grandpa. That all must have been horrible."

"Yeah. But we had no one to blame but ourselves."

Bram fingered the edge of the comic book. "Every time I read one of these, Grandpa, I end up thinking about things a little differently," he said slowly. "Like when I read the first one. Most of my life I thought of Abraham Erskine as just a co-worker of Grandma's back in the day. I mean, sure, he invented something pretty cool, but it didn't really mean much to me personally, even though he was my namesake. At least, that's what I thought."

"Our family owes him a debt," Steve agreed. "One that can't ever really be repaid."

"Well, if we can figure out how to do what Dr. Erskine did, it would be a start," Sarah said. "Dave and I did the math once. If we could cure just one thing — heart disease — then every year we could save the same number of lives Hitler _took_ during each year of the war."

Bram opened up his comic book to a certain page and showed it to Steve, frowning. "Is this really the end of the story, Grandpa? I mean, I know I'm supposed to be relieved that all the Winter Soldiers died before they got thawed out, but I was kind of curious to see what they transformed into."

"They didn't transform into anything," Steve said, puzzled by the question.

"But all the rest of you did," Bram pointed out. "You and Schmidt, and Banner and Blonsky. You all came out of your experiments looking wildly different from how you did before. How come the Winter Soldiers didn't?"

"The super-soldier treatment had a three-pronged approach, Bram," Sarah said, lowering the comic book she was holding in order to fully join their conversation and slipping comfortably into scientist mode. "First there was the serum itself — a chemical composition that works by loosening genetic patterns and leaving them open to change. Then there was the radiation, which provides a burst of highly concentrated energy for any subject who needs a significant increase in mass."

"E=MC2," Bram supplied.

"Yep. Just like Einstein said. So, if you were, say, a 5-foot-4, 100-pound guy who needed to grow 10 inches and more than double his weight-"

"-or if you wanted to be a 8-foot-tall green giant..." Bram added wryly.

"Right. Of course, now we know that the Vita-Rays were a more stable form of radiation than gamma rays. That's why your Grandpa's transformation was permanent instead of cyclical, like Banner's. Anyway, the radiation is optional. Schmidt didn't get it at all, and neither did Blonsky in the first stage of his transformation."

"So after the serum and the radiation, what's the third factor?" Bram asked.

Sarah shook her head and smiled sadly. "I wish I knew. Something that determined the new structure of the subject's genetic code. If you look at the four subjects who received either Erskine's original formula or a serum that was derived from your Grandpa's blood, they all ended up with a dramatic change in appearance. But Bucky, who got Arnim Zola's variant, and the rest of the Winter Soldiers, who got Howard Stark's... they got stronger, yes, but they didn't change appearance. Obviously there was something in Erskine's formula that integrated with the subject's original genetic structures that the serum loosened, and that "something" provided a new pattern. And it was apparently a unique pattern for each individual... we ended up with a walking death's mask, a green giant, a hideous abomination, and-" She smiled ruefully at Steve. "-a college quarterback."

"Wasn't it just some form of genetic engineering?" Bram asked. "I mean, they can alter plant DNA now to make crops that produce more per acre..."

"Your father thought of that, but it doesn't fit," Sarah said. "For one thing, genetic engineers today stand on the shoulders of a lot of other scientific discoveries that hadn't been made yet in the 1940s. Obviously, Dr. Erskine was ahead of his time in some ways, but I don't think he could have taken that big of a leap on his own. For another, less than a week passed between when they chose Grandpa for the experiment and the day they actually carried it out. There wouldn't have been time to map out his genetic code, much less tinker with it strand by strand."

"Well... however Erskine did it, maybe Zola and Howard's formulas were an improvement," Bram said slowly. "I mean, at least Bucky and the others didn't end up looking like monsters."

"But they were mentally unstable," Sarah pointed out. "Bucky was left susceptible to mind control, and the other Winter Soldiers were so violent and unpredictable that even Hydra despaired of trying to control them. The original four did end up with personality amplification, of course — Banner's anger, and Blonsky's lust for power, and Schmidt's megalomania — but that isn't quite the same thing as actually going crazy. Whereas Grandpa managed to stay completely sane, and for that matter so did all of his quasi-super-soldiered descendants."

"So far," Bram quipped with a grin.

"Anyway, I do think Erskine's formula was the superior one," Sarah continued, "if we could ever figure out what that missing third factor is... and why the physical pattern Grandpa ended up with was so much more appealing than what the other three got." She picked up the comic book she'd been reading when Steve first came in, and flipped through it, skimming with her eyes more than reading it.

The three of them fell into a comfortable silence, sitting side by side on the couch as the sunshine streamed in through the window and the leaves of the aspen tree in the backyard fluttered in the breeze. On the radio Jon Bon Jovi was singing "Blaze of Glory," around the corner they could hear Dave's clinking microscope slides, and in the distance they could hear the younger kids laughing in the front yard.

"Dad?" Sarah asked curiously, breaking the silence after a few minutes. "What is this?" She pointed to the open page of the comic book she was looking at, the volume Steve had drawn about his own transformation at Camp Lehigh. Steve leaned over to look.

The panel Sarah was pointing at depicted Erskine and himself sitting in the barracks the night before the procedure, facing each other, holding drinking glasses.

"Schnapps," Steve said. "From Augsburg."

"No, I know that. What is _that_?" Sarah repeated, pointing to a piece of paper Steve had drawn into the scene, tacked up on the wall of the barracks just behind the bottle of schnapps.

"Oh, that's a sketch I made of myself," Steve answered. "Of what I thought I would look like after the procedure."

He'd drawn himself in full Army gear, looking tall and strong and serious — much the way his father had looked in the only photo Steve had ever possessed of him, dressed in his own U.S. Army uniform days before being shipped out to fight in the Great War — a fight he had never returned from.

Sarah squinted at the tiny picture within a picture. "Is that a literary flourish, or is that something you actually did?"

"It's real. I drew that a few days before I was chosen. It was part of the testing they put us through, with the hypnosis session and everything."

Bram looked over at him strangely. "Whoa, wait. Dr. Erskine _hypnotized_ you?"

"He hypnotized all the final candidates," Steve said. "It's really not that surprising. Hypnotism was a big trend during the years he was training in his profession. A lot of doctors in both America and Europe were experimenting with it in those days, using it for all kinds of things. I know it sounds kind of hokey now, but-"

"Hypnotism isn't hokey," Sarah said quickly. "There's plenty of evidence that it does work for certain things — I mean, it's terrible for recovering repressed memories, and it can't make people do things they don't want to do, no matter how many movies insist that it can — but you _can_ use hypnotism to tap into the subconscious. I'm just trying to understand why he needed to do that to administer the SSR tests. What kinds of things did he say to you while you were under? Can you remember?"

"He gave me ethical scenarios," Steve said, "and asked what I'd do in those situations."

Sarah nodded slowly. "Makes sense. He already knew about the personality-amplifying side effect because of Schmidt. He wanted to make sure he wasn't going to give the serum to a bad egg. But what does that have to do with this drawing you made?"

"Well, after we talked about the scenarios, he asked me to describe in detail what I would look like after the experiment, if I was chosen."

"But how could you be expected to know?"

Steve shrugged. "He explained it to me in general terms — that I'd be in perfect health, and that I'd be stronger and faster than before, and so on." He scratched the back of his neck. "Anyway, I was kinda embarrassed to tell him what I was picturing, but he insisted it was part of the test, and after a while I said it would be easier for me to draw it than to say it, so he tore a paper out of his notebook and had me sketch it out."

"While you were still hypnotized?" Bram asked.

"I guess so. I felt pretty relaxed."

Sarah looked back down at his sketch, and blinked a couple of times. "Dad, this is uncanny. I mean, your sketch is a dead ringer for you. You predicted your new body _exactly_. You're sure he didn't describe your appearance to you in detail? With measurements and all?"

"I'm sure. After I drew that, he asked me how tall I would be. I said, 'I don't know. How tall would the serum make me?' And he had me guess how tall I thought the perfect soldier should be. I guessed 6 feet, 2 inches, and he said that was exactly right, that that's how tall the serum would make me."

Sarah stared at him. "Dad, that doesn't make any sense."

"Why not?"

"Because Dr. Erskine had no earthly idea how tall the serum would make you."

Steve frowned. "How do you know?"

"Because-" Sarah suddenly jumped up and dug out a thick packet of papers from a stack on top of the filing cabinet. "-he and Howard Stark had a big dust-up over exactly that issue. It's all right here in Howard's notes that Mom copied for me out of the S.H.I.E.L.D. archives. Howard was building the Vita-Ray chamber using titanium, which is not exactly cheap, and they were already way over budget. He didn't want to build the chamber a single inch longer than it needed to be, so he kept pestering Dr. Erskine to tell him exactly how tall the subject would end up, but Erskine couldn't tell him. Not until almost the last moment." She flipped through the pages for a minute. "See, here it is. Right here." She pointed at the date in Howard's notes.

Steve looked at the entry for a long moment. "What does that mean?" he asked at last.

"I don't know. I don't understand how Dr. Erskine could tell you that you were right in guessing your future height, when Howard Stark was chomping at the bit to know and Erskine didn't tell him until the day _after_ he administered your tests."

Just then, they heard the door around the corner opening, and then Dave greeting Peggy. The next moment Peggy came around the corner, with Dave following at her heels.

"How did the transfer go?" Steve asked, but already his heart was sinking, because he could see how serious she looked.

Peggy shook her head, gray curls bouncing, and pressed her lips together in a straight line.

"As badly as it could go." She met Steve's eyes, her expression furious. "The Tesseract's gone missing."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** Let me know what you think! Please leave a review._


	13. Chapter 13

_**Author's note:** I'd like to thank girliemom, dissatisfieduser, Guests, LatteLady and MaggieHo for your reviews! It's so encouraging to get feedback and know that someone is reading!_

* * *

**1990**

"Where's Bruce Banner when you need him?" Steve asked no one in particular, rubbing his temples wearily.

"Where _is_ he?" Mike asked, looking up hopefully from where he had been staring moodily at a knot in the kitchen table. "Is there any chance he could-"

"He's a student at Harvard," Steve said dully. "Undergrad. He's nowhere near an expert on gamma radiation yet. We're just gonna have to track the Tesseract down ourselves."

"How are we supposed to do that?" Tien asked. She had just joined them in the kitchen after hustling all the kids to bed. She moved aside her laptop, where she had been working on her memoirs; now that the children were older she had finally tackled a long-planned project to record the story of her upbringing in Vietnam and her journey to America. "By now it could be anywhere."

"Not anywhere," Peggy said. "Hydra didn't take it only to shove it in the back of a closet somewhere. They'll have taken it to a lab where they can continue their experiments, and the equipment needed to harness it is rather specialized. That would restrict their options a bit."

"Was Howard Stark in the lab when you went to make the transfer?" Steve asked.

"Yes."

"How did he react when it turned up missing?"

"He was furious," Peggy said wearily. "But then, he was already furious with me about having to hand it off in the first place. Now he doesn't know _who_ to be furious with, and frankly, I don't know who I'm supposed to be furious with, either. There was obviously at least one inside man, maybe more. We questioned everyone. No one saw anything. The footage from the security cameras had been erased, along with the entrance scanner records. Whoever it was, they were extremely thorough."

"Well," Steve said, pulling himself out of his gloom with an effort and forcing himself to sit up straighter. "Look at the bright side. Obviously we're going to succeed in tracking the Tesseract down, since we know Dr. Lawson eventually got it."

"That's very comforting, darling," Peggy said a little tartly. "But it doesn't really help us find it now, does it?"

"I have an idea, Mom," Mike said slowly. "But I don't think you'll like it very much."

"Beggars can't be choosers," Peggy said.

Mike took a deep breath, leaning forward with his elbows resting on the table. "What if we put Howard Stark under surveillance?"

Peggy was quiet for a long moment. "I suppose it could be wishful thinking on my part," she said at last, "but I don't think Howard would go so far as to be involved in this. 'Borrowing' another inventor's ideas is one thing. Stealing an item as valuable — and dangerous — as the Tesseract is something else entirely."

"Even if he wasn't involved," Mike pressed, "I think watching him would be useful. Think about it. Does Hydra have any scientists who can do more with the Tesseract than Howard could? I mean, they probably could have stolen the thing at any time. They obviously found it more useful to leave it in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s possession where Howard could have access to it, so they could benefit from his genius. They only took it away when they realized he was losing his grip on it."

"They might try to recruit him now," Steve agreed, "or more likely, strong-arm him into cooperating with them. Bribery, or blackmail, or threatening his family." The latter option was how Hydra had controlled Dr. Erskine. Steve felt a pulse of worry. They tried to keep an eye on Tony at all times, but ever since he had graduated from MIT three years ago at the precocious age of 17, he had gone into globe-trotting mode, and it was hard to keep track of him.

Peggy thought for a long moment.

"I'm going to set some of my people to tracking electricity usage in the area," she said at last. "If someone starts fiddling with the Tesseract, there's bound to be fluctuations. And then... yes," she added to Mike reluctantly. "Use your team to watch Howard. As much to keep him safe as anything else."

"We'll be discreet," Mike promised.

They broke up their impromptu meeting; Mike going outside to call in the dog, while Tien got up, stretched, and started putting away the clean dishes.

"You okay?" Steve asked Peggy, standing behind her and squeezing her shoulders and neck gently, feeling the tension in her muscles.

Peggy closed her eyes briefly in appreciation for his touch, but she shook her head. "My friendship with Howard is tenuous enough," she said glumly. "If he knew I was spying on him, I'm not sure he would believe I was doing it for his protection."

"I know," he said. "It's a hard choice, with your duty on one side and your friend on the other."

Peggy reached back and covered one of his hands with hers. "I know you know. And these Starks... they don't make it easy on us, do they?"

He smiled a little sadly. "But you can't help but love them anyway."

* * *

Steve's eyes snapped open in the middle of the night. An extremely high-pitched whistle was being blown somewhere nearby — and although it only had one note, it was being blown to the distinctive rhythm of the first few bars of the "Star-Spangled Banner."

It was a signal he and his children had worked out long ago if they wanted to call for each other without disturbing anyone else, especially Peggy, who had sometimes worked, and slept, odd hours when she was an active-duty agent. Since no one but the three of them could hear that pitch — unless you counted dogs — it had become their own private signal.

Moving silently so as to not wake Peggy, Steve slipped out of bed, put on his slippers and crept out of the bedroom and made his way to the front door. When he opened it, Sarah was standing there on the porch fully dressed.

"Good morning," Steve said mildly, glancing at his digital watch. "Barely."

"Dad!" she whispered excitedly, grabbing him by both wrists and shaking him a little. "I figured it out!"

"Figured out what?"

Sarah released him and waved her hands expressively in the air, struggling for a moment to find the words. "_Everything_! What we've been doing wrong with our version of the serum, why the animal testing didn't work, why Howard and Zola's variants were missing the transformative power that Erskine's formula had... _everything_!" She hadn't taken the time to put her blonde hair in its usual ponytail, and the untamed waves framing her face were lit up by the streetlamp behind her like a halo.

"Calm down," Steve whispered, acutely aware that this might be the first time he had ever had to utter those particular words to Sarah, although he'd worn them out on Mike when he was small. "You were right not to wake up your mother, she's had a hard day. Here, come in." He stood aside to let her come in, and without needing to discuss it with each other, they tiptoed downstairs and into the den, where they could talk without fear of disturbing Peggy.

Steve shut the door quietly behind them. "Okay. What do you mean, _everything_?"

Sarah sat down on the worn but comfortable love seat, and then almost immediately jumped up again to pace across the floor. "Here's the thing," she started, her eyebrows contracting with deep concentration. "The problem all along is that we've been missing the third factor, the pattern that determines what the subject's new physical form will be. Right? Dave and I assumed all this time that Dr. Erskine must have somehow incorporated a blueprint, so to speak, in the serum to create your new phenotype, using genetic engineering or some other method we haven't discovered yet, but that was wrong, wrong, wrong — _he_ didn't decide how you were going to look at all!"

"Then who did?" Steve asked, mystified.

Sarah took a deep breath. "Dad, _you_ did."

His brow crinkled in confusion. "What?"

"I figured it out," Sarah said breathlessly, pulling a rolled-up comic book out of her back pocket and smoothing it out before handing it to him and tapping on one of the panels. "It was this sketch you made before your transformation that clued me in. You predicted what you were going to look like, _exactly_. That would be pretty amazing, Dad... except it wasn't a prediction at all! _You were designing your own body_, dreaming it up inside your head, pulling out desires from the deepest parts of your subconscious. _That's_ why Erskine hypnotized you! He wanted a glimpse into your psyche so he could be absolutely certain you weren't going to turn yourself into a monster the way Schmidt did!"

Steve opened his mouth for a second, and then closed it, frowning.

"It makes perfect sense," Sarah insisted, answering his unspoken question. "Dr. Erskine told you that the serum enhanced what was already inside a man, right? And you thought — we all thought — that he was talking about the personality enhancement... and that was definitely part of it, but there was more to it than that! He meant your physical appearance, too — why else would he be unable to tell Howard Stark how tall you were going to end up, until _after_ he had tested you? He didn't know you would be 6 feet and 2 inches tall until you yourself had _decided_ that that was how tall you wanted to be! I mean, be honest, Dad... what did you think when you first saw yourself in a mirror, after the experiment?"

"That I looked more like my dad," he said slowly.

"And you signed up for the war in the first place because you were trying to emulate him. Yes?"

"Yes," Steve admitted. It was why he had chosen the Army instead of another branch of the military, why he'd even tried to get into the 107th, the same division his father had fought in.

"You said it yourself, Dad." She grabbed the comic back from him and flipped rapidly through the pages until she found the panel she was looking for. "See, here? When you and Mom bumped into each other in Italy, after your performance for the troops there? You told her that thanks to the experiment, you got everything you ever wanted. That wasn't a coincidence. That wasn't _luck_. It was the serum doing what it was designed to do. You _wanted_ to look that way... and so you did. Your own mind provided the pattern for your new phenotype."

Steve was quiet for a moment. "I'm not saying you're wrong," he said at last, "but there's a problem with your theory. Why would Schmidt have _chosen_ to look like he did?"

"I've got an answer for that, too," Sarah said quickly, pulling another paper out of her other back pocket. She unfolded it, revealing a dot-matrix computer printout bearing the image of a giant skull, coated red with blood. "Look familiar?"

"What is it?"

"This is Ymir," Sarah explained. "He's a figure in Norse mythology — you remember how obsessed Schmidt was with all those old stories? Ymir was the first created being, the father of the Frost Giants, the ancestor of Odin himself. He was the god of gods, and the world itself was created inside his skull, fashioned from his flesh and blood and brains — real savage stuff, these Norse myths. Anyway, Ymir was meant to symbolize limitless potential. And wasn't that Schmidt's obsession? He imagined himself becoming the superior man, rising up to become a god in his own right. So when he was injected with that serum..."

"He became what he imagined himself to be," Steve murmured.

"It may not have been a conscious wish, but if it was deep down inside him, it would become reality."

"And Blonsky-" Steve started.

"Yep. He saw the Hulk, and he went green with envy, no pun intended. So the next time he got a dose of the serum, he was picturing himself as even bigger and scarier than the Hulk. And that's what he got: an abomination." She thought for a moment. "The only thing I'm not sure about is Bruce Banner. I mean, he was a pretty decent guy at heart. Why would he want to look so-"

"-monstrous?" Steve finished softly. "I can guess why." He took in a slow breath. "He told me things in confidence. I won't go into detail, but there were things that happened in his childhood, things that should never happen to any child. Things that left him feeling angry... and powerless. I can see why, deep down inside, he would want to make himself impossibly big and strong — almost indestructible — someone no one would dare touch ever again..."

He rubbed the back of his neck, lost in thought. "But how do you explain Bruce's second transformation?" he asked. "He turned into something different that time."

"Nothing easier," Sarah said. "Look at how he did it. He extracted another dose of serum from your blood and injected it into himself. In other words, he loosened up his genetic code and triggered the transformational power of the serum for the second time, only this time, he wanted something different. This time, he wanted to blend together the best of both the Hulk and of Bruce Banner, and that's exactly what he got."

"If your theory is right," Steve said, his mind running along her track at a fast clip now, "it would mean that the personality-enhancing side effect-"

"-isn't a side effect at all," Sarah finished firmly. "It's _the_ effect, it's what the serum is. It takes everything that's already inside you and manifests it in the real world. Good becomes great, bad becomes worse, and the little guy who couldn't win a fight is suddenly 6 feet tall and capable of getting back up again no matter how many times he's knocked down. That's the reason why no one's experiment turned out exactly like yours did, Dad, and why they never could. It's unique to each individual." Sarah flashed a smile at him. "There's only one Captain America because there's only one Steve Rogers."

Steve looked down at his body in wonderment. Everything he had ever valued, everything he had wished he could be, both inside and out — could he really have made it happen to _himself_? Suddenly he understood why the first words out of Dr. Erskine's mouth to him had been a simple question: _What do you want?_ It _had_, in fact, been a test, the only one that really mattered: to choose a candidate whose deepest desire was simply to kill — even Nazis — would have been extraordinarily dangerous.

"Your choices fascinate me," Sarah continued thoughtfully. "Not only did you design a body that was perfectly suited for a soldier, but you also made a few subtle changes to your face. I did a side-by-side comparison. You actually lengthened your jawline slightly, along with a few other minor changes. Basically, you made yourself a shade more attractive than before." She suppressed a teasing smile, bringing out the faintest hint of a dimple in her cheek that was rarely seen. "Almost as if there was some girl around who you were trying to impress."

"I guess it kinda worked," Steve said mildly.

Sarah shook her head a little, smiling. "She loved you before that, Dad. Mom respected Dr. Erskine so much that she would have paid special attention to his choice anyway, and then 10 seconds after you two first laid eyes on each other, you had to go and _smile_ at her when she punched a bully in the nose, instead of being surprised or horrified or threatened like every other soldier standing in that line."

"Bonding over bullies," Steve said in a musing tone. "Classic technique for attracting beautiful dames. It's funny, but that one never really worked for me before that day."

"Well, fortunately for you, you followed it up with win after win in Mom's eyes," Sarah said with a short laugh. "If the flagpole exercise won you her admiration, the grenade incident really cemented things: You weren't like any other man she had ever met."

Then she grew more serious. "Anyway, the really interesting thing to me is how human you remained after the procedure. There must be some limits to how much the serum can change, but there seems to be a wide range of possibilities. Schmidt believed he had left humanity behind, and maybe he did — in the worst way possible — but look at _you_. You can still walk down the street and not look out of place, unlike the other three... and what's maybe more significant, you were still compatible enough to start a family with an unenhanced individual. I guess somewhere deep down inside, you just wanted to stay a regular guy."

Suddenly an idea occurred to Steve. "You said my abilities were unique to me. But you and Mike have the same qualities," he pointed out. "Just in smaller quantities."

Sarah shook her head. "But we've never been exposed to the serum," she said. "Not by injection or blood transfusion. We came about through more... natural means." She raised an eyebrow and smiled at him knowingly. "Technically, I'm not sure we're super-soldiers at all, because we never experienced a transformation. We were just beneficiaries of your newly improved genes, starting from the very first moment of our conception, just like any other parent and child."

"You said you knew why the animal testing didn't work."

Sarah nodded confidently. "It's because animals aren't sophisticated enough to have any desires beyond instinct. So if I injected them with the serum while they were hungry, they would eat themselves to death. If they were sleepy when I injected them, they would just want to sleep, forever. It can only really work on a creature with free will."

"Even if you're right about this, how does knowing it translate into figuring out how you'll need to adjust your formula?" Steve asked.

Sarah took a long time to answer.

"That's just it," she said slowly. "I'm not sure we need to adjust our formula at all. Dave and I are confident the chemical composition is correct. It was the third step we were missing, the new pattern for the body, and now that we know that comes from the mind of the subject himself..."

"Yeah, but how do you make that happen? How does the idea become reality?"

"I don't know yet," Sarah said softly. "But one thing I do know: we've left the realm of science. We're talking about faith, about the power of belief. It's magical thinking, Dad. It's... well, _magic_."

Steve was startled. "You think Dr. Erskine used _magic_ on me?"

Sarah looked at him, her eyes pleading a little. "Does that sound so crazy?"

Steve let it sink in for a long moment. "Maybe not," he said at last. "Thor used to say that science and magic are one and the same. At least in a place like Asgard."

Sarah nodded, a new — and stranger — excitement growing in her eyes. "And here, too," she said eagerly. "You've told me before that when Wong explained to you where the Masters of the Mystic Arts got their power from, he said that _'at the root of existence, mind and matter meet. Thoughts themselves shape reality.'_" She shook her head in amazement. "That wasn't just mumbo-jumbo. You saw for yourself, their powers were real. And if they could use their thoughts to shape reality — if Dr. Erskine could do it — then maybe..." She trailed off.

Steve smiled knowingly. "You always loved the stories about magic best, ever since you were a little girl. I used to catch you imitating Wanda Maximoff's hand movements when you thought no one was looking."

She laughed softly. "I must be crazy to even be considering this. But I keep thinking about the first strand of the serum that we were able to isolate, the strain that affects the cardiovascular system. If I found a way to enchant it — or program it, however you choose to word it — and then we injected it into someone with a heart condition and asked them to visualize their heart beating, strong and healthy and whole-"

"-they could be convinced to cure themselves."

"Permanently. Like you were." Her eyes suddenly glistened with unshed tears. "If this works, we could save a lot of lives this way, Dad. A _lot_."

* * *

It was less than two weeks later that Steve got a call just as he was finishing up a group therapy session at the VA, and after making as graceful an exit as he could, he jumped into his car and rushed over to Mike's house as quickly as possible.

When he came through the door, the first thing he saw was Mike's oldest, Natty, rummaging urgently through the coat closet in the foyer, shoes and hockey sticks and jackets tumbling out as she searched for something so intently that she barely glanced up at Steve as he came in.

"The black ones!" Mike called from the living room.

"I _know_, Dad!" Natty replied. "The boys made a mess in here again. Wait... aha, I got 'em!" She dragged a pair of black combat boots out from under a pile of sporting gear, scrambled back to her feet in a surprisingly graceful movement and hurried around the corner with them. Steve followed her.

Mike was just sitting down onto one of the wing chairs, dressed in his black Vo Binh Dinh uniform and holding out his hand expectantly for the boots Natty had just unearthed for him. The younger three children were lined up on the couch, obviously under strict instruction to stay quiet and out of the way. Sammy and Clint were watching the commotion with wide eyes, looking both worried and confused, but Harrison was jiggling his knee with nervous energy, brow contracted, leaning forward with every muscle tense as though at any moment he might leap to his feet.

"Thanks, honey," Mike said to Natty, taking the boots. "Do me another favor and see if you can find a ski mask too, a dark one," and Natty hurried to obey, going up on tiptoe to reach the basket of winter clothing on the top shelf of the closet. At 16, she had already reached her full growth, halfway between her mother's diminutive frame and her father's height, with much of her length in her legs. That made for graceful dancing, and a very deceptive appearance: despite her more slender build she was now every bit as strong as Bram was.

"Tien?" Mike called. "Can you-"

"Already loading it," she called from the direction of the kitchen, where the clink of ammunition could clearly be heard.

"You beautiful creature," Mike called back with a laugh. "You read my mind."

"What's happening?" Steve asked. Their family's paranoia had grown in tandem with Hydra's cunning, and they no longer discussed sensitive details over the phone.

"We intercepted a message Howard Stark got from one of his former colleagues on the P.E.G.A.S.U.S. team," Mike explained, tugging on his boots. "Nothing but a time and a place. Looks a little suspicious; this isn't anyone Howard was close to personally."

"And guess where the meeting is?" Peggy called out from the kitchen. "One of the locations my people flagged for power fluctuations recently."

Mike grinned. "So we're going to crash the party."

Natty came tripping back over with a ski mask just as Tien came into the room with Mike's gun and holster in her hands. Mike stooped to give Tien a quick kiss before pulling the ski mask on, leaving only his eyes exposed.

"Dad, you look like you're trying to pass for a ninja," Natty teased.

Tien handed him his gun. "You know what? It's a good look for you," she said, looking at Mike with a sly smile on her curved red lips.

Just then Peggy walked into the room, heels clicking. "Make sure you don't interfere, Mike, unless you're certain that the meeting is related to the Tess-" she started as she loaded her own handgun with practiced motions, and then glanced up at Mike and suddenly demanded in a sharp tone: "What do you think you're doing?"

Mike turned to fully face her as he adjusted his ski mask. "I think it's best to keep my face covered for this mission, Mom, just in case any of the rats get away. I don't need Hydra memorizing my face. I'd lose my anonymity as Agent 45."

Peggy suddenly took a step back and put her hand on the back of a chair for support. "Michael Steven Carter!" she said, trying to sound scolding and only succeeding in sounding shaky. "For a moment I thought you were your _father_."

"It's the eyes, Mom," Mike said helpfully, pointing at them. "Brown, not blue."

"Yes, I know, darling," she said tartly, hiking up her skirt and stooping to strap the holster to her thigh. "But the two of you are shaped the same."

"I have an inch on him," Steve put in.

"And I'm more fun at parties," Mike added.

"That's true," Steve agreed.

Mike slid his gun into its holster and glanced out the window.

"Dad," Harrison said from his place on the couch, breaking into the conversation for the first time, his voice intent. "I want to come with you."

Mike didn't hesitate for a second. "Not happening, sport."

"I can help just as much as anyone on your team," Harrison insisted.

His younger sister Sammy turned to stare at him. "What are you, delusional? You're _13_."

"Almost 14. And you know I can," Harrison said stubbornly, not breaking eye contact with his dad. He knew better than to say any more in front of his two younger siblings, who were still in the dark about certain things, although he clearly wished that he could say a whole lot more.

"Look at your mother, son," Mike said flatly. "She's never going to agree to that."

"Then what did you teach me to fight for?" Harrison demanded.

"So that when you are _grown up_," Mike emphasized firmly, "you can help with things like this."

"But Dad-"

"Discussion's over."

Harrison turned to look at Steve meaningfully. "_Grandpa_-"

"It's your parents' decision, not mine," Steve said mildly.

Peggy trotted over to the window and pulled aside the curtain. "The team is here," she said to Mike. "Time to go."

"You're staying in the van to coordinate, right?" Steve asked Peggy, trying not to sound anxious. "And leaving the fighting to Mike and the others?"

"Don't you dare remind me of my age, or I'll remind you of _yours_," she said, and reached up to give him a quick kiss. "I'll be careful, darling. And yes, I'll stay in the van... unless I'm needed elsewhere. The rest of me may be slowing down, but there isn't a thing wrong with my aim."

She left with Mike hot on her heels. The front door slammed and a few minutes later the van's engine roared away into the distance.

With a growl of frustration, Harrison launched to his feet and went up the stairs, taking them three at a time, and then his bedroom door slammed. Sammy and Clint exchanged wordless glances and then got up and left, too, both of them going out the back door where the dog could be seen looking through the glass hopefully with a tennis ball in her mouth. Despite the gender differences and a two-year age gap, the two of them had always been on the same wavelength to the point that Tien sometimes jokingly referred to them as twins.

Finally, Natty stooped to give her mother a quick kiss on the cheek before swishing upstairs and knocking softly on Harrison's door, which opened after a few seconds to admit her.

The two of them left alone in the suddenly quiet room, Steve and Tien looked at each other for a long moment.

"They'll be fine," Steve told her.

"Are you trying to convince me, or yourself?" Tien asked a little too knowingly.

"You know what?" Steve said with a soft sigh, putting his arm around her slender shoulders. "It was easier to be the one who left, than the one who stayed behind."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:**__I'd love to hear what you think, whether it's about how the plot is advancing regarding the Tesseract, the unfolding mystery of the super-soldier serum, or the development of characters like Mike's children (and Sarah's children from the last chapter). Leave a review and let me know!_


	14. Chapter 14

**November 1990**

Michael Carter crouched against the warehouse, his body shielded by a wall of weeds growing up through the cracked asphalt. The traffic was only a faint hum in the distance, here in the overgrown and largely deserted manufacturing district. "Svoboda?" he murmured into his wrist com.

"Almost there." Angelika Svoboda murmured back, her voice coming in clearly through his earpiece. "Stand by."

There was a soft clicking sound, and suddenly Mike could hear someone else, a man's voice echoing as if in a large empty room.

"Mic in place," Svoboda whispered.

"I hear it. Nice work." Back in the van, his mother would be listening to the audio, too.

"Is that what I think it is?" The voice coming through Mike's earpiece was unmistakably Howard Stark's. "Is that the harness I built for-" He broke off. "Oh, my God. What have you done?"

"Mr. Stark, the research you were working on could have saved lives. It could have changed the world." Mike recognized the second voice, too, a woman with a distinct Australian accent: it was Dr. Campbell from the P.E.G.A.S.U.S. Project. "We saved this. For _you_."

"You _took_ it?" Howard said, sounding bewildered and awed, all at once. "_You_ took it?"

"Carter was going to hand it over to NASA so they could build a light-speed engine." Campbell laughed with a hint of contempt. "A _light-speed _engine! Not only is it a pipe dream, but even if we _could_ leave this planet, does anyone here think that's actually a good idea? Humanity is fractured, divided; we spend our days squabbling with each other over oil, over politics, over religion. We're not going anywhere until we can impose order on ourselves. You can help with that, Howard. The Tesseract can help with that."

"That's enough for me," came his mother's voice crisply through Mike's earpiece. "It's here. Move in."

Without hesitation Mike used his jimmy to pop open the window. Around the corner, out of his sight, Agent Veiga would be doing the same, while Svoboda would be making her way to the north entrance, having successfully planted the mic on the basement-level window.

"All I wanted to do was build a cheap, self-sustaining energy source," Howard said in his earpiece, his voice brusque and businesslike. "I wasn't looking to impose _order_ on anything."

"Don't shortchange your work," Dr. Campbell said. "If you succeed, Howard, you could end the oil wars in the Middle East. You could make inroads into global poverty; there are still millions who don't have access to reliable electricity. You would be immortalized as a man who irrevocably changed the world for the better."

Mike slipped in through the window and crept down the darkened, deserted corridor. Getting in the building was the easy part; for Hydra to stay hidden it had to look deserted from the outside and therefore there could be no visible security... but there were bound to be safeguards inside.

"I thought you were the one who kept pushing for me to forget the energy experiments and develop weapons instead," Howard pointed out dryly.

"You've built enough weapons to see the sense in that, Howard," Campbell responded. "There will always be warlords, terrorists, organized crime... and superior firepower would protect everyone who just wants to live their lives in peace." There was a pause before Dr. Campbell continued. "Look, it doesn't matter to me what you want to build first, Howard. Let's get started. It will be better for you and I to work independently from S.H.I.E.L.D. That way whatever you come up with can be put on the market; you would be free to choose your buyers yourself. There's a lot of profit to be made."

According to Mike's transponder, he was getting close. So close that he could hear faint movements further down and around the corner; guards had probably been posted at all the entrances to the room Stark and Campbell were in. Where the Tesseract was being kept. Mike ran his eyes along the exposed ceiling of the warehouse corridor until he spotted what he was looking for. He crouched, and then leapt high, grasping onto a water pipe with one hand and a heating duct with another. He hung there silently for a moment, praying nothing would bend or crack under his weight, and then — when he was sure — he swung himself upside down and used his feet to gently, gently push in the grate set into the ceiling and carefully slide it to the side until it rested on top of the ceiling panel next to it.

Every muscle tense, Mike eased his frame through the narrow opening, moving as carefully and quietly as he could, until at last he was in the dusty confines of the building's ductwork.

"You're not wrong about the profits," he heard Howard say. He took a deep breath and let out a dry chuckle. "But you're crazy if you think S.H.I.E.L.D.'s going to sit back and let you do it. You don't know Director Carter like I do. She'll never stop hunting for this thing."

"When she realizes how many eggs she'll have to crack to get it back..." Dr. Campbell's voice had gone lower and slower. "-she'll be dissuaded."

"No, you don't get it." Howard's voice grew sharper as Mike army-crawled along the duct. "It's _personal_ for her. The man she loved died getting that thing away from Hydra. It doesn't matter how much trouble you make for her. She'll never give up. Don't be fooled by the pretty face and the posh accent. Her backbone is made out of steel."

"Let us worry about that," Campbell said. "You just concentrate on your work. Think of the _profits_, Howard."

"Who's we?" Howard asked abruptly.

There was a long silence.

"I said, who's _we_?" As he got closer Mike realized he could hear Howard's voice coming through the ductwork now, not only through his earpiece. "Look, if we're going to work together, I have to know what that means," Howard continued. "You didn't set this up all by yourself, Dr. Campbell. Who is funding you? Who is calling the shots? Because I don't play well with others. You know that."

"We're philanthropists," Dr. Campbell said emphatically. "We're trying to make the world a better place."

"And stealing the Tesseract is going to help you do that?"

Mike crawled up to a vent in the bottom of the duct and looked down. He could see Howard Stark and Dr. Campbell standing next to Stark's harness device... and there was the Tesseract itself, resting in its slot, washing blue light across the dusty warehouse floor. A thrill shot through him.

"I'm in place," he whispered softly into his comm. "Target in sight."

"The Tesseract doesn't belong to any one person." Mike could see Dr. Campbell below him, clenching her hands into fists at her sides, obviously trying to restrain her annoyance. "It isn't S.H.I.E.L.D.'s or Director Carter's or anyone else's... it belongs to _humanity_!"

Howard smirked slightly, his white hair and mustache tinged blue by the light of the Tesseract. "Oh, so you wouldn't mind if I moved it into _my_ lab, then?" he asked, his voice thick with sarcasm. "Set my own people to guarding it? Or are you the only self-appointed representative of humanity who gets to control it?"

There was a long, cold silence.

"That's what I thought," Howard said at last. "Thanks, but no thanks. Look, if you want to go to war with S.H.I.E.L.D., that's your business. But you're going to have to do it without me." The anger was rising in his voice, his face reddening. "And you're also going to dismantle that harness that _I_ designed and send it and every single blueprint you have to Stark Industries in the next 24 hours, or my lawyers are going to have a field day with you in court. That's _my_ machine and _my_ design, and you have no right to it!"

Having said his piece, Howard spun on his heel and marched away, until he was just out of Mike's line of sight as he peered through the vent. There was a rattling sound.

"Open the door," Howard snapped.

"We haven't finished talking." Campbell was standing stock-still, the harsh glare of the warehouse lights washing out her face to a pale blur.

"If you don't have this door open in 10 seconds, Dr. Campbell," Howard said, biting off the words, "I'm going to start to think I'm being held here against my will."

"East entrance secured," Mike heard Veiga whisper in his earpiece.

"Almost there," Svoboda chimed in, just as softly.

Dr. Campbell's voice went smooth and soft. "No one's making you do anything, Howard, but I think you'll find we're very protective of the Tesseract. I don't allow any of my people to leave this building knowing its location, not without giving me certain assurances first. Like you said, having Director Carter show up on my doorstep would be inconvenient."

Mike tensed his muscles, preparing to burst down through the vent; whether Svoboda was ready or not, if they actually intended to hold Howard against his will...

Suddenly there was a high-pitched sound, and then a clang of metal hitting the floor. A whiff of an acrid smoke drifted up through the vent, and Mike had to hold his breath to prevent himself from coughing.

"What is _that_?!" Campbell burst out, eyes locked on Howard, her hand suddenly freezing in the very act of reaching down toward her lab coat pocket.

"Hand-held laser," Howard Stark replied, his tone nonchalant. He slowly walked back toward Campbell and back into Mike's view, holding something small and metallic in his hand. "You like it? I made it myself, just tinkering around. Burns hot for its size. Don't put your hand in that pocket, Campbell, and don't take one single step toward me, or the next thing I cut through won't be a _door_."

Campbell grew livid. "How _dare_ you-"

"No, how dare _you_!" Howard shot back with equal feeling. "Did you really think I'd agree to your so-called partnership?" A scowl crossed his face. "You know, I might be a lot of things, but at least I'm not a dirty little thief. I'm leaving, _now_, and no one better follow me out, or they'll find out just how hot my laser runs."

There was a loud bang as the door behind Howard suddenly burst open, and Howard let out a surprised grunt as a man dressed in black charged through and knocked the laser out of his hand, sending it skittering across the warehouse floor.

"I'm moving in," Mike said tersely into his comm, and then he unceremoniously double-kicked the vent and came crashing down through the ceiling to land cat-footed on the dusty floor.

In a single glance he saw Dr. Campbell whirl to face him, a startled expression on her face, and just behind her the Hydra guard froze in the middle of trying to restrain a struggling Howard Stark, body tensing as he tried to size up this unexpected new threat, this masked man dressed in black.

Howard slammed his elbow in the man's gut in the same instant that Dr. Campbell put her hand in her lab coat pocket. Mike didn't hesitate. His leg swung out and connected with Campbell's hand, knocking away the gun she had just grasped and sending it spinning across the factory floor. Wide-eyed, she backed up rapidly, holding up her hands to show they were empty. Mike's eyes darted over to Howard, who had used the precious seconds in which his attacker was distracted to wrench himself from the man's grasp and scramble away as nimbly as a man his age could.

Mike gave the man no time to grab Howard again. He was there in a single bound, swinging his fist, and the man blocked the blow with his arm but grunted in surprise at the force of it, even though Mike had instinctively pulled his punch a little. He had long ago learned not to use his full strength unless he had no other choice, partly to avoid spilling blood needlessly, and partly to avoid calling too much attention to himself. By now some of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents Mike had worked most closely with over the years had some idea of his true capabilities, but the trust among them ran so deep that his team respected his wishes and didn't ask too many questions.

But Mike had known from the beginning of this mission: recovering the Tesseract was paramount. If ever there was a time to unleash his full power, this was it. He stared the other man down, standing between him and Howard, daring him to make a move.

The other man's eyes narrowed, and he leapt forward and attacked fearlessly and viciously — he was clearly a trained fighter, unlike Dr. Campbell, who had stumbled back fearfully from the fight, showing no inclination to interfere. It was impossible to watch her properly while his hands were full with this man, and Mike was acutely aware of the fact that the Tesseract was not secured. But he had a feeling calling for backup was useless; through his earpiece he could hear a flurry of thumps and grunts from his team members.

"Veiga?" Mike asked as he delivered a kick that sent his opponent sprawling.

"I'm under attack!" came Veiga's voice in his ear. He grunted again, loudly, and there was a loud crash. "But my entrance is secure… so far."

"Svoboda?" Mike demanded.

"I'm overrun!" she answered through his earpiece, sounding breathless. "Some of them got past me. You have incoming!"

Mike resisted the impulse to swear, and slammed his fist into the guard's gut, dropping him just as half a dozen more men spilled into the room, dressed in combat gear and carrying handguns. Within seconds one of them had trained his sights on Mike and pulled the trigger.

He _saw_ the bullet before he heard it, a tiny blur speeding through the air toward him, and without conscious thought he dodged it, his muscles obeying his instincts with whip-fast reflexes. The bullet zinged off the Tesseract's harness behind him, ricocheted, and struck the wall right behind Howard Stark, who threw himself to the ground, wide-eyed, far too slow to have saved himself if the bullet had been just a foot to the left.

"_Hold your fire!_" Campbell shouted at the men urgently, her high-pitched voice echoing through the cavernous room. "We need Stark!"

Without hesitation the men obeyed her, holstering their guns and pulling out strange-looking rods instead. Taser rods maybe, like those Natasha Romanoff would one day wield? But they didn't look quite like what Dad had drawn in his comics…

The men fanned out, ignoring Howard and moving in on Mike from multiple directions, their expressions eager as they brandished their rods. Six against one… they were confident they could take him. And he wasn't inclined to use his gun any more than they were; he needed Howard to be safe as much as they did.

The first man took a swing at him with a rod, which Mike easily sidestepped, and immediately he ducked, too, having _heard_ rather than seen a second man attacking from behind.

The second man's rod whooshed harmlessly over Mike's head and struck the first man, who was still attempting to recover his balance. A bright blue flash lit up the side of the man's neck as the rod made contact with it, and he screamed in agony before collapsing onto the floor, wisps of smoke rising from the burnt wound.

Even more warily that before, Mike whirled around with fists up, facing each of the remaining five men in turn. _Were_ those Tasers in the men's hands? The man who had fallen victim to the blow of his comrade's rod was lying motionless on the ground; not merely stunned, but apparently unconscious or maybe even dead. And that bright blue flash Mike had seen… it looked less like an electrical spark and more like the light the Tesseract was putting off.

Suddenly he felt sick; could those rods have been powered by the Tesseract, like the weapons Arnim Zola had designed so many years ago for Johann Schmidt's use? After all, these people still had access to Zola's mind…

Two different men leapt at him, once again with one in front and one behind, working in tandem in a well-timed attack, and once again Mike used his quicker reflexes to avoid contact with those strange rods.

These men were accustomed to fighting in well-rehearsed, coordinated maneuvers, he realized, heart beating in anticipation as he returned to guard position. Like a pack of wolves. There were benefits to that… but there were also downsides.

The man standing to his left, the tallest one in the group, abruptly launched a flying kick at his chest. Without hesitation Mike caught his foot with both of his hands and then _twisted_, sending the man into a horizontal spin before he hit the ground with a surprised grunt. Without bothering to look behind him, Mike whirled and curved out a right hook, just in time to make eye contact with the man who had been behind him before he staggered back, dropping his rod and clutching at his nose.

A third man was already in motion, and this time Mike had the space to lash out with a power kick that sent him flying ten feet into the air, shattering one of the suspended warehouse lights with his body before crashing down into the harness, shaking the Tesseract in its slot and sending jittery blue rays of light scattering around the room.

There were several cries of surprise, and then a shocked silence fell. Abruptly the men still standing backed up away from Mike, real fear showing on their faces for the first time.

"He's some kind of freak!" one of the men shouted, sweat beading on his face.

"I don't care _what_ he is!" Dr. Campbell shrieked at them from the shadows at the edge of the room. "Just kill him!"

Mike quickly took stock of the situation. Three men still well and whole, and two that were attempting to shake off their injuries and join back in the circle, one with blood pouring from his nose and the other favoring a leg. All five of them had a sudden wariness on their faces. There was a pregnant pause. Then...

The bald man directly in front of him spoke a single word, in a grim voice: "Typhon."

It was like a spell had been broken. Suddenly all five of the Hydra men exploded into action. For the next several seconds it was pure chaos, with Mike ducking and punching and blocking and headbutting, as arms and legs and metal rods came swinging at him from all directions with no apparent rhyme or reason.

Panting hotly against the ski mask covering his face, Mike quickly lost himself in the familiar whirl and clash of hand fighting, one moment using vo binh dinh, the next capoeira, the next aikido, switching so effortlessly between them that the Hydra agents were caught continually off-guard. There was no time to think, only react. Men were crying out sharply all around him, flying up and then hitting the ground, slamming into each other, dropping their rods.

But there was a method to their madness. His full attention absorbed in fighting the men still on their feet, he had no bandwidth left to keep an eye on the injured men lying on the ground. Mike heard the subtle buzz of a weapon being activated down at his feet, and his limbs were simply too entangled with the other combatants to immediately do anything about it. His eyes darted down just in time to see the first man he'd brought down swinging a rod feebly at his legs.

The rod didn't even really strike him, just touched him in the calf with no more force than a leaf falling from a tree.

Everything stopped.

_Agony_.

Pure, unadulterated agony. Pain like he had never felt before — pain that shut off all thought, all vision, all sound — pain that wouldn't even let him feel his body hit the floor, though he dimly understood that he had just gone utterly limp. Every single nerve in his body on fire, too intense to let him scream, too much to even let him breathe. A thick blackness crept across a field of gray, and even though Mike was desperate to stay awake, desperate to recover the Tesseract and protect Howard, there was simply nothing he could do, no defense for this.

He blacked out.

He didn't know how long he had been out when his consciousness returned.

The first thing he became aware of was the hard floor underneath him. He realized he was lying on his back, eyes locked open, staring up at the ceiling, vision blurred and wavery. _Everything_ hurt, even his insides, and the smell of burning flesh hung heavy in the air.

A face swam into view.

"Well, well, well. Not so inhuman after all," the bald Hydra agent said, bending down over him with a gloating smile made rakish by a split lip. He had a gun in his hand, and he casually pointed it at Mike's face, only a foot away. "Let's find out if you bleed red just like the rest of us, freak."

He coolly pulled the trigger at the same instant Mike mustered every ounce of strength that had returned to him... which wasn't much.

It was just enough to let him clumsily swat at the man's hand just as the deafening crack of the gunshot retorted. There was a sudden blast of heat and fresh pain against the left side of his face, and desperately Mike flung himself to the side, rolling over painfully once, twice, rolling over something hard and cylindrical as he went. There were Hydra agents lying motionless on the floor all around him.

The bald man — the only one still standing — started in surprise at his movement before recovering his wits and raising the gun again, eyes darkening. Scrabbling desperately by his side, Mike felt his aching fingers close around the hard cylinder he had rolled over: one of the pain-rods. One finger touched what felt like a switch, and he flipped it without hesitation and threw the rod at the bald man.

It struck him across the face with a flash of blue light.

The man dropped instantly, his mouth opening to cry out but not a sound escaping, and he writhed silently on the floor for interminably long seconds before going deathly still, the rise and fall of his chest halting, his eyes glazed.

Shakily, Mike pushed himself up and staggered to his feet. So the pain-rod _did_ kill, or was supposed to. Had he gotten lucky, that he had only been touched with one lightly? Or had his cells regenerated quickly enough that it was his serum-enhanced genetics that had saved him?

Every inch of him still hurt, his face most of all. Wincing, he put his hand up to his left cheek, and it came away bloody even through the ski mask. He could see a small broken crater in the concrete floor where he had been laying when the gun went off; the bullet must have narrowly missed him and blasted his face with heat and bits of concrete. His left ear was ringing loudly, and sounds were strangely muffled on that side. The gunshot had damaged his hearing, going off so close to him. He hoped fervently that it wasn't permanent.

He looked around the warehouse, feeling his strength beginning to return bit by bit, and his eyes fell on Howard Stark… who was bent over next to the harness, using a pair of clamps to maneuver the Tesseract into a small carrying case. He was surrounded by equipment that had been overturned and scattered messily around him. A large canister had tipped over, its lid rolled five feet away, a thick oily liquid now oozing its way across the floor. Had Howard been in a scuffle of his own? Dr. Campbell was nowhere to be seen.

Mike strode toward Howard, feeling more and more like himself again. In the very act of closing the case, Howard glanced up and saw him coming. Abruptly the vague expression of worry on his face changed to one of incredulity… and fear.

Mike opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, the sound of approaching footsteps made them both turn.

Dr. Campbell emerged from the shadows at the edge of the room, cradling something bulky and metallic in her arms. A gun of some kind, an enormous one, one that looked nothing like anything Mike had ever seen before, all gleaming surfaces and sleek curves and glowing blue lines. Another Tesseract-powered device? Howard was standing directly between her and Mike, and she was pointing the weapon at both of them.

Just then both Viega and Svoboda ran into the room — the entrances must have been secured at last — and abruptly froze when they saw the standoff.

"Put down the Tesseract," Dr. Campbell said to Howard softly.

"Or what?" Howard asked contemptuously. "You'll shoot? Don't be stupid! If you fire _that_ while I'm holding _this_" — he was holding the Tesseract case like a shield in front of his chest — "the energy discharge is going to kill everyone in this room! Including _you_."

A dark smile tugged at one corner of Campbell's mouth. "You think I'm afraid of that?" she asked in a low voice. "It won't hurt the Tesseract a bit… and as for my life? It would be a privilege to give it for the cause. There are more than enough to take my place." She flipped a switch down by the stock, and the weapon's whine intensified. Her eyes narrowed to slits. "Cut off one-"

Mike stomped on the edge of the canister's lid where it rested by his feet and it flipped up into the air, and in a flash he snatched it edge-first and flung it toward Campbell with a mighty heave.

She hadn't even fully turned toward the sound when it struck her in the head edge-first, and she crumpled to a heap on the floor, the weapon slipping out of her grasp with a loud clatter.

In only a few swift strides, Mike was by her side, kicking the weapon away and ensuring Campbell was no longer a threat. Then he turned toward Howard.

Instinctively backing up away from him, Howard slipped in the puddle of oil and fell backwards, but instead of catching himself with his hands he kept a tight grip on the Tesseract's carrying case, clutching it protectively against his chest as he went down hard.

Mike held up his hands briefly to show that he meant no harm, and then went down on one knee and offered Howard a hand up. Howard met his eyes, and suddenly his fearful expression changed to one of wonderment as recognition seemed to dawn.

"_Steve_?" he gasped, looking up at him in disbelief.

Mike paused for a moment. "You know what? That's the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me," he said, smiling behind his ski mask.

Howard let out all his breath out in a sudden huff. "You're not-" he started, and several different expressions crossed his face within the span of seconds: relief, and confusion, and more than a little regret. "The way you were fighting, I thought-" He took a deep steadying breath and then accepted the hand Mike held out to help him up.

Once again on his feet, Howard straightened up slowly, wincing a little as he put his hand to his back, and then looked at Mike with narrowed eyes just as Veiga and Svoboda walked up to flank him.

"Who _are_ you?" Howard asked.

"Someone who's in a better position to keep the Tesseract safe than you are," Mike said. He held out his hand again, this time for the case, but Howard only clutched it against his chest a little tighter.

"You work for S.H.I.E.L.D.?" he demanded suspiciously.

"I work for Director Carter," Mike corrected. "Not exactly the same thing these days, is it?" He glanced at Dr. Campbell's still form sprawled across the floor, and then held out his hand again, but still Howard hesitated.

"I think you'd better give it to him, Howard."

They both turned toward the voice. Peggy was walking toward them, gun still holstered, surrounded by several more S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.

"Dr. Campbell was willing to die just to buy a little time," Peggy continued matter-of-factly. "She must have called for reinforcements. I think we should have the Tesseract well out of reach by the time they arrive, don't you?" She stopped, hands on hips, and surveyed Howard calmly.

Howard glanced down at the case, and finally, reluctantly, he handed it over to Peggy.

"My team will escort you to your car and follow you home to make sure you get there safely," Peggy told him. Then she nodded toward Howard's hand-held laser still lying on the floor by the door. "But before you go, better use that to destroy the harness device."

"_Destroy_ it?" Howard repeated, looking dumbfounded.

"I think it's a bad idea to leave it lying around here, don't you?"

"Let me send some of my people here," Howard said. "They can dismantle it and transport it to Stark Industries and-"

"My people are going to be here waiting to ambush Campbell's reinforcements and then get rid of the evidence. And you don't need the harness because you won't be working with the Tesseract again," Peggy said firmly. "_Ever_."

Howard narrowed his eyes. "You mean you're still going to hand it over to Dr. Lawson? You've got to be kidding me. What makes you think it's any safer with her than it is with me? I actually have _experience_ fighting Hydra."

Peggy went still, and Howard laughed humorlessly. "Oh, yes. Don't bother pretending to look surprised. These idiots have Hydra written all over them. But you already knew that, didn't you?" His expression hardened. "You knew Hydra was back. Why didn't you say something?"

"I _did_," Peggy said irritably. "After Dr. Greiling disappeared I warned you repeatedly that there was an internal problem, that you couldn't assume anyone at S.H.I.E.L.D. was trustworthy-"

"You never said _Hydra_-"

"I can't speak openly to you, Howard, because I don't know who around you can be trusted!" Peggy retorted. "You went behind my back working with Greiling to copy Hank Pym's work, you showed an _appalling_ lack of judgement, and-"

"You just can't bring yourself to forgive me, can you?" Howard snapped. "After all I've done for you, and for S.H.I.E.L.D., and for this country, I make one little mistake, and you _still_ don't trust me? What more do I have to do to prove myself to you?"

"It isn't about forgiveness, it's about protecting the Tesseract, and protecting you. At all costs!" Peggy shot back. "If Hydra infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D., what makes you think they haven't infiltrated Stark Industries as well? You need to clean house, Howard! Even the people closest to you may have been compromised. Be honest with me. Up until today, did you have _any_ notion that Dr. Campbell was involved in something shady?"

"If you knew, than you should have-"

"I _didn't_ know!" Peggy shot back, frustration coloring her voice. "Not until the Tesseract was already gone. I'm not omniscient, you know, much as I wish I were. We _both_ have egg on our face this time, and I'm not ashamed to admit it."

Howard scoffed loudly, and shook his head, pressing his lips together firmly as if to stop a fresh torrent of accusations from pouring out.

"Look, there's no point in us standing here blaming each other when the real enemy is out there, and probably moving in right now," Peggy said pointedly. "We need to clear out of here."

They did exactly that, with Howard carving up the harness with his laser efficiently and silently, his face set in stone, and then several S.H.I.E.L.D. agents in an unmarked car escorted him as he drove back home. Mike followed his mother, who was carrying the Tesseract in its case, back toward the van, keeping a careful watch as they passed more agents headed in to set up the ambush.

Once they were in the van, his mother put down the case with a small sigh of relief, and then looked over Mike with concern. She reached up to pull off his mask carefully, and gasped a little once it was off. She put a gentle hand under his chin and turned the left side of his face toward her.

"Oh-" she started to say in dismay, and then quickly cut herself off before she said his name in front of the other agents in the van. They knew him only as Agent 45, and they certainly didn't know his relation to the Director. It was safer that way.

"Just a little shrapnel," he said dismissively, but he refrained from mentioning the fact that he was still having trouble hearing out of that ear. He didn't want his mother to send him off for medical care when he had no intention of taking his eyes off the Tesseract until it was safely in Dr. Lawson's hands.

Without waiting to be told, Agent Svoboda rummaged around the back of the van until she found the first aid kit, and began to dab disinfectant on his wounds with gentle hands. His mother finally sat back in her seat, relaxing slightly, and laid the case securely across her lap.

"Better make sure-" Mike started.

"Yes," she agreed, and she carefully opened the case a crack. A bright blue light streamed out and lit up her face. His mother stared inside for a long moment and then slowly closed it again, her expression thoughtful.

"Where to?" Collins asked from the driver's seat.

"Andrews Air Force Base," Peggy said, coming back to herself and speaking authoritatively. She sat back with the case clasped firmly in her arms, and the van started to move.

They were there in less than half an hour, and found Dr. Wendy Lawson waiting for them at the appointed place, the wind whipping through her short hair as fighter jets roared overhead. Peggy got out of the van, and Mike followed her and stayed a pace behind and to the right as she walked with the case held tightly in her hand.

"I apologize for the delay, Dr. Lawson," Peggy said as they met on the tarmac. "But I have it here, safe and sound." She held the case out.

"I can't thank you enough, Director Carter," Dr. Lawson said, and the sincerity was evident in her eyes as she took it with equal care. "You don't know what a difference this will make for my project."

"If you do good with this, that will be thanks enough," Peggy said with equal sincerity, meeting her eyes warmly. Then she added, "I hope you have a safe way to transport that to your lab."

Dr. Lawson glanced back to where a young blonde woman was waiting back by the aircraft, dressed in an Air Force flight suit with a helmet tucked under her arm.

"I believe Captain Danvers already has the engines warmed up and waiting," Dr. Lawson said, turning back toward Peggy.

Peggy smiled slightly. "Then it looks like everything's in good hands."

* * *

When the operation was complete — with the second wave of Hydra agents dispatched and Peggy returning to personally confirm that the evidence in the warehouse had been disposed of — the two headed back wearily to Mike's home, where they found both Dad and Sarah were waiting for them there along with Mike's own family. Mike had never been more grateful to accept the fierce hugs of his wife and children, even if Harrison had then looked at the bandages on the left side of his face with a scowl and ground out: "I _told_ you I should have come with you."

And when Sarah had finished testing his hearing and shown him the results, she sat back and looked at him soberly.

"Tell me what you're thinking," she said.

"I feel like a jerk for even caring," Mike said reluctantly. He reached up to touch his left ear gingerly. "I mean, I still have enhanced hearing in the other. And the hearing on this side isn't much worse than what it is for a normal person. I shouldn't... I shouldn't be ungrateful."

"But you've never known anything else," Mom said softly. "You're allowed to grieve for it."

Mike closed his eyes momentarily. "I've known all along that I'm not invincible. But sometimes I kinda felt that way." At his side, Tien squeezed his hand comfortingly.

"Where _were_ you earlier today?" Dad asked Sarah suddenly. "When I came by your house I asked Dave, and he started acting funny and wouldn't give me a straight answer."

"Oh, Daddy, I'm afraid I've... gone and done something a little reckless," Sarah confessed.

"_You_?" Steve said, puzzled. "What did _you_ do?"

"I drove to New York today," she said matter-of-factly. "To Greenwich Village, Bleeker Street. And I pretty much just walked through the doors and asked for a teacher."

"At the Sanctum?" Dad asked, shocked.

She nodded, managing to look both embarrassed and defiant at the same time. "I met with the Master there, Daniel Drumm, and explained to him what I was trying to do with the serum, and... well, Dad, I've never done it before in my life, but I went ahead and dropped your name. The Ancient One said her people would be keeping an eye on you, so I figured it would be safe enough. I don't know how often middle-aged mothers wander into their domain asking to learn magic tricks, and I just... I needed them to take me seriously."

All of them stared at her for a long moment. "Well, what did they say?" Dad asked at last.

Sarah reached down into her pocket and showed him a slender metal bar with a pair of loops, designed to slide over two fingers.

"They said if I was going to attempt reality-bending spells," she said calmly, "it would be safest to do it in the Mirror Dimension."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note: **This was a monster of a chapter to write, with a lot of plot to move and action to show, as well as quite a bit of important development for multiple characters, not to mention setting things up for the next big sequence... but hey, I enjoy a good challenge! _

_Howard Stark is as tricky a character to write as Tony Stark is, and for the same reason: he's essentially a good guy, but there's no getting around the fact that he has some significant flaws, too. I hope I hit the right balance of portraying him accurately (after all, he himself admits in "Endgame" that the greater good often did not outweigh his self-interest) but also not downplaying his good traits. Like Tony Stark, he frequently _tries_ to be a better person, and sometimes succeeds. Let me know what you thought._


	15. Chapter 15

_**Author's note: **Thanks to girliemom, gaa and the many Guests who left reviews!_

* * *

**March 1991**

"You're so quiet tonight," Peggy said softly to Steve one night as they were getting ready for bed. "You're thinking about them, aren't you?"

She didn't have to say anything further; Steve knew what she was referring to. At this point in their marriage their minds had a tendency to run together on the same track; there were times when he didn't know if he had any truly original ideas anymore, the way his and Peggy's thoughts tended to merge and flow and weave together, sometimes with hardly even a need for words.

"Yeah," he said with a sigh, sitting down on the bed. It had been weighing on him, the approaching deaths of Howard and Maria, and not just lately, either. Really, it had been weighing on him since the first moment he had been given reason to suspect their deaths were not an accident after all — that terrible day when Peggy's S.H.I.E.L.D. had turned against him and the artificial mind of Arnim Zola had hinted that Hydra had been involved somehow. It had been a blow, to think that his old friend Howard might have died that way, at an age when he should have been getting ready for a well-deserved retirement to live out the rest of his years in peace and luxury. And then he had met the Winter Soldier on the bridge, and recognized Bucky, and not long afterward it had occurred to him that it might have been Bucky himself who had been sent to do the dirty work.

It had been hard to think of it. Bucky and Howard, who had met each other through their mutual friendship with him, who had drank together and sang together and given Steve a hard time about Peggy together… in a cruel twist of fate, could they have ended up pitted against each other?

The worst part was that he didn't know for sure. _Couldn't_ know for sure. Zola's mind had been destroyed before he and Nat could confirm the disturbing insinuation one way or the other, and despite their best efforts he and Sam had failed to find Bucky fast enough to get the truth from him. One thing Steve knew for certain: if it _had_ been Bucky, he would never have done something like that willingly. And so Steve had allowed two years to pass by as he clung to the faintest of hopes that he would somehow rescue Bucky and find a way to see that justice was done, to prove that Bucky was not responsible for his actions, to protect an innocent man from both Hydra and the law...

And then there was the most painful regret of all: that Steve hadn't kept Tony in the loop about any of it.

He'd told himself countless times that he didn't know for sure that Bucky had done it. That he was sparing Tony unnecessary pain by not dredging up an already painful memory and making it even worse. That even if it had been Bucky, it had ultimately been Hydra that was responsible, and that justice was served with the deaths of Alexander Pierce and Baron von Strucker and Brock Rumlow and every other Hydra agent the Avengers brought down. Steve had told himself all these things, and he had believed them. After all, he had always been honest to a fault, even to himself.

Never mind the quiet but persistent uncomfortable feeling he kept buried down deep inside during those years: that it was really himself he was protecting.

Finally, when Zemo had thrown his evidence into their faces and Steve had been confronted with Tony's disbelieving eyes — and yes, his justifiable anger — Steve had been forced to face the full truth: that he simply hadn't been able to bear the thought of losing one more thing. Not one more.

His whole life, he had given of himself. Given until it hurt. No complaints, no regrets, no holding back. It was how he'd been raised. He'd volunteered for a war and seen unimaginable death and despair — dealt out plenty of it himself, and carried the burden of _that_ — had delayed pursuing Peggy in favor of pursuing Hydra, and in the end had chosen to lay down his own life to save countless others.

Only that hadn't been the end of it. He'd come back to life only to find out that he'd lost more than he had ever dreamed it was possible to lose: his own place in time, and everything and everyone that went along with that. He had lost the woman of his dreams, first to time and then to death itself.

And then he had crossed paths with Bucky against all reason or hope, and it had felt like the universe was finally offering something to Steve in return for everything he had sacrificed. And even though he knew that Bucky was not the same man he had been, that rehabilitating him might not even be possible... during those years that he and Sam had searched for Bucky, Steve hadn't been able to stop himself from dreaming about what the reunion could be like. To no longer be the only man out of time, alone in a world that he didn't belong to. To have someone who had suffered the same losses he had, and understood them in a way no one else could. Someone to remember the old times with. Someone to talk about Peggy with. And not just anyone — his best buddy. The only person besides his mother who had seen a young Steve Rogers for who he truly was, long before the world knew him as Captain America.

Finally, he would have a chance to repay Bucky for all the times he had sailed in with both fists to protect Steve. For his staunch friendship. For the way he and his family had practically taken Steve in after his mother's death. And Steve could absolve himself of the guilt he had felt the day he failed to prevent Bucky's fall from the train. Everything that had gone wrong could be made right again.

With that gift nearly in his grasp, he hadn't been about to stand the thought of having it taken away from him... and Steve had reason to fear that Tony's tendency to think with his heart instead of his head would endanger it all. And so he had permitted himself one moment of selfishness. Just one. And the price he'd paid for for his silence had been incalculably heavy: it had destroyed his friendship with Tony and torn the Avengers apart at a time when they could least afford it.

He had no one to blame but himself. But it was hard not to think that none of these things would have happened in the first place if Hydra had not chosen to assassinate the Starks.

"Steve…" Peggy said slowly as she sat down next to him on the bed. "Are you sure, absolutely sure, that we can't change this?"

"We've been through this before," Steve said wearily. "With Janet Van Dyne."

"I know," Peggy said, looking troubled. "But this… this feels different. Janet chose her fate. She sacrificed herself to save others. Howard and Maria… they're going to die for _nothing_, and they're not even going to see it coming, much less choose it. It just… it feels very wrong."

"I know," Steve said softly. "But even if we managed to change it, you know what will happen."

"A branch in the timeline," Peggy answered reluctantly. "An alternate future."

"And the Ancient One won't permit that to happen," Steve finished. "She'll clip the branch."

"But why?" Peggy demanded with a sudden passion. "_Why_ must she? How could saving Howard and Maria make the future _worse_ rather than better?"

"Easy. If you change their fates, you change Tony's. And his life is the one thing we can't meddle with. Everything depends on it."

Peggy was quiet for a long moment. Then: "Explain that."

"Peggy, if there's one thing you've made clear over the years," Steve said gently, "it's that this is the one thing about the future you don't want explained to you."

She reached up to fiddle with a strand of hair, a rare expression of uncertainty. "How much is there left that I don't know?" she asked after a beat. "Because I feel like I must know almost everything you do by now."

"You probably do," he admitted.

"I know something bad happened," Peggy said. "Something so bad that you and the Avengers were willing to do something as drastic as travelling through time to fix it. Something that was worth Tony and Natasha dying for."

"Yes."

"I assume it was a disaster of some kind. Something that killed a lot of people."

"Yes."

"And you haven't told me the nature of the disaster because-" Peggy slowed her words, sounding reluctant to let them move past her lips "-because I've told you I don't want to know about anything bad that's going to happen to our family."

"If there's one thing you've been consistent about, it's that."

"That's the part that doesn't make sense," Peggy said, growing suddenly fierce. "In that time you didn't know we _had_ a family. So how could you possibly know whether any of our family were among the victims?"

"I can't really answer that, honey. Not without telling you-"

"Then tell me."

Steve paused for a long moment, looking her over carefully. "What, all of it?"

"Yes," Peggy said positively. "All of it. I don't want to be in the dark anymore. I want to know everything you know. If I'm expected to just sit back and let my friends die a meaningless death, I have to know exactly what I'm doing it for."

"It'll be hard for you to hear."

"I know. I've been thinking about this for a long time. I'm ready for it."

Steve took a deep breath, collecting his thoughts. He'd had many years to think through how he would explain this when the time came. "It wasn't a small disaster, what we faced in the future," he told Peggy. "Not like the war you and I fought in."

Peggy's eyes widened. "World War II, a _small_ disaster?"

"Yeah. Only 75 million people died."

"_Only?_"

"I told you. It was bad."

Peggy visibly braced herself. "How bad are we talking? How many people died?"

Steve knew it was right that Peggy should know this at last, knew that it was time and maybe past time, and yet he couldn't stop himself from asking one last time: "Are you sure you want to hear this?"

Peggy spoke with a clenched jaw. "How many?"

Steve took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Four billion."

"Billion?" she whispered. Disbelief filled her eyes. "Four _billion_? How… how is that _possible_? What weapon could possibly-"

"And that was just our planet."

Peggy's chest heaved with suppressed emotion. "Other planets, too?"

"_Every_ planet. Every place in every corner of the galaxy. Exactly half of all life was eliminated. It was…" He closed his eyes for a moment, remembering. "It was unimaginable. It was unreal. We couldn't really understand for the longest time that it had really happened, that we had failed _that_ badly..."

As clearly and succinctly as he could, he explained to her Thanos' twisted mission, and the gauntlet he had made with the Infinity Stones, and the Decimation he had unleashed the fateful day he had snapped his fingers and transformed his dark vision into reality. Then he had to sit back and wait as Peggy, finally understanding the magnitude of what had happened, put her face in her hands and cried sharp, bitter tears.

"So that's how you know it happened to our family, too," Peggy choked out when she could speak again at last. Her eyes were distant, almost as if she was speaking to herself. "So many lives… We couldn't possibly have gone unscathed."

"There wasn't a man, woman or child who wasn't affected," Steve confirmed grimly. "For every person there was a 50-50 chance. And anyone who didn't vanish in the Snap still lost someone. A parent, a spouse, a child…"

"Oh, God," she whispered, looking sick. "Our children, Steve… we had two babies. _Two_. If the Decimation took every other person…" She took several shaky breaths. "We're going to lose one of them, aren't we? Maybe even both."

His only answer was to clench his jaw; this was something he had tried very hard not to think about over the years.

"All our grandchildren," Peggy continued, horror in her eyes, "they'll be married by then. They'll have children of their own. And _half_ of them…"

"I know," Steve said, giving her shoulders a squeeze.

"And _you_," Peggy said in a choked voice. "I know I won't be around by then, but if you are…"

"I managed to beat the odds once," Steve said matter-of-factly. "If I were a gambling man..." He didn't bother finishing.

"But you fixed it," Peggy said, with the air of a woman grasping at straws. "You undid it. You and the Avengers. Didn't you? Isn't that what the time machine was for?"

"Yes. We brought everyone back. But it took years. _Five_ years. Years that no one could ever really get back."

He opened his dresser drawer and pulled out one of his comic books, the last one he had drawn of the Avenger years. The only one Peggy had never seen. He gave it to her to read, and answered all of her questions to the best of his ability, as midnight came and went and the rain fell steadily on their roof outside.

"Now you see why we can't save the Starks," he said at last. "Of all the scenarios that Dr. Strange saw, the only one that ended with a victory depended on a Tony Stark who had lost his parents, who had learned to carry responsibility on his shoulders. A Tony Stark who became Iron Man and developed the convictions he needed to lay down on the wire and let everyone else crawl over him."

"I hear you, and I understand," Peggy said. Her voice was rough with emotion. "But I don't like it."

"I don't like it either," Steve agreed. "But it isn't really about following some arbitrary rule about time travel, or trying to avoid having the Ancient One come sailing in with the Time Stone to undo whatever alternate futures you and I might accidentally create if we changed the past. Even if I was wrong about how all of that worked, consider the fact that all the other Avengers had access to the same Quantum Tunnel I did. None of them suggested, or tried, to use it to undo _anything_ except the Snap. Natasha could have gone back to stop the KGB from training her as an assassin. Bruce could have used it to prevent his own gamma accident. Even Tony himself could have warned his father, when the two of them met in 1970, and tried to save his parents that way.

"But he didn't. None of them did. They all understood the same thing: that whatever the personal cost, bringing back everyone Thanos Decimated was more important than trying to undo our own pain. That's why, as much as I wish we could save Howard and Maria..."

"We can't," Peggy whispered.

* * *

They laid down in bed together, and held each other until Peggy finally drifted off to sleep, puffy-eyed and exhausted from her grief. But Steve could not sleep. He laid there wide awake, with his hand over Peggy's, and let his thoughts run their natural course as the hours slipped by. And when the morning sun began to stream through the window, Peggy stirred in bed, and then slowly opened her eyes and saw that he was already awake and sitting up in bed, leaning against the headboard.

"Have you been up all night?" she asked, brow furrowing. She still had dark circles under her eyes; whatever sleep she had gotten had not been restful.

"Peggy…" Steve said. "We already know we didn't save Howard and Maria's lives."

"Yes," she said, looking defeated. Resigned.

"But do we know that we didn't _try_?" Steve asked slowly.

She sat up in bed and thought about that for a long moment. "I… suppose not."

"Then-" Steve met her eyes firmly. "I think we should try."

"Try to save them?" Peggy repeated, looking surprised, and no wonder. "But you said last night-"

"-that we can't save them. I know. But I thought of something while you were sleeping: there's really nothing to stop us from trying."

Peggy gave him an incredulous look. "_Knowing_ that we're going to fail?"

"Yeah."

Peggy let that sink in. "So that you can feel better about it?" she asked, a deep concern for him growing in her eyes. "Unburden yourself of the guilt?"

"No," Steve said firmly. "Because it's the right thing to do."

"Steve, that's-" Peggy shook her head in wonderment. "That's _insane_, and completely hopeless, and I think... maybe the bravest thing you've ever said."

"Think about it," Steve said, growing more animated as his conviction set in. "Isn't that what we would do if we didn't know the future? If you had found out in a natural way that Howard was making super-soldier serum, even if you didn't know how it would all end, wouldn't you try to convince him to give up the project? Or at the very least be more careful about how he did it?"

"The thing that's bothered us about this all along," Peggy said slowly, "is that Howard and Maria didn't seem to have a choice about their fates. But do we know that's true?"

"If there's one thing this whole trip to the past has taught me," Steve said, "it's that I don't know as much about what happened during this time as I thought. I never knew that I knew the Pyms, that I taught Hope how to fight. I never even knew about the existence of my own family. I have a lot more space to work with than I thought I would when I decided to come back to you.

"You're saying that perhaps their deaths had more meaning than we realized?"

"The only thing I know for certain about Howard and Maria's deaths is the camera footage Zemo showed us," Steve pointed out. "Only two minutes' worth of information. We know that the news coverage of their deaths was wrong."

"And you have the last conversation Tony had with them before they died," Peggy reminded him.

"I don't even have that," Steve said.

"But that machine he invented, the retro-framing device," Peggy said, frowning thoughtfully. "You saw the video of the presentation he made to MIT about it, didn't you? I thought you said it transferred his memory into visual form."

"That's just it," Steve said. "The reason Tony invented the device was so that he could alter his memory of that day for therapeutic reasons. The memory I saw was a lie. I can tell you exactly how Tony _wishes_ that last conversation with his parents went. But I have no way of knowing what was really said." He took a deep breath, looking unhappy. "I assume it was a fight. Something ugly between Tony and Howard. Otherwise, he wouldn't have felt the need to change it."

They sat together on the bed thinking for a while, as the sunlight streamed through the blinds and warmed them both.

"Let's do this," Peggy said, breaking the silence with a firm determination in her voice. "Let's try to save them."

"Let's do it," he agreed, and neither one of them could help but smile at each other, feeling a sudden surge of hope despite the hopelessness of this mission. It felt right, and that meant there was nothing left to consider.

"We'll need Mike's help, at the very least," Peggy said in a business-like way.

"We should get the whole family in on this," Steve said.

"Are we going to explain everything to them?" Peggy asked. "Everything about… Thanos?"

"I didn't want to tell any of them unless and until you knew," Steve said. "But we should tell Mike and Tien, and Sarah and Dave, at least. They're going to live through it, and I think they have a right to know."

"What about the children? The ones who are already inducted into the Captain America Club?"

Steve sighed. He hated to think of burdening the grandchildren with knowledge that terrible, but on the other hand, it might be a kindness for them to know sooner rather than later. And a few of them, like Bram and Natty, were nearly adults anyway. "I think we should leave that decision up to their parents."

* * *

They immediately put their plan in motion, and about a week after Steve and Peggy had told their children and their spouses everything, they reached out to both Sarah and Mike again and were informed that they had decided to tell the four oldest children — Mike and Tien's Natty and Harrison, and Sarah and Dave's Bram and Maggie — everything as well, their parents having decided that it would be for the best.

Steve and Peggy were the first to arrive at Sarah's house for the family meeting, and Dave let them in and led them down to the basement, where the half-windows had been covered with black-out curtains so that Sarah could practice her newfound skills down there without fear of the neighbors seeing. When Steve and Peggy came down the stairs behind Dave, they saw Sarah hunched over a musty old book in a pool of bright light cast by a lamp, reading the tiny handwritten lines with an intent expression. Bram was leaning over her shoulder, reading just as intently.

"Is that from the Sanctum?" Peggy asked curiously, coming over by them.

"From their library, yes," Sarah said distractedly.

"Making any progress?" Steve asked.

"Well, if establishing how Dr. Erskine _didn't_ enchant the serum is progress," Sarah said, straightening up wearily, "then yes, I'm making progress."

"How _didn't_ he do it?" Steve asked.

Sarah rubbed her bleary eyes. "Here's the thing. Master Mahika started me off learning how to gather extra-dimensional energies to cast spells. That's how the Masters of the Mystic Arts make portals, and how they get in and out of the Mirror Dimension. There's just one problem. Extra-dimensional energy runs really... _hot_, for lack of a better word. That's good when you're conjuring weapons and shields, because you want them to be as powerful as possible. But I need to be able to cast spells over a _person_, not to destroy but to heal, and the human body is a delicate thing. Using dimensional energy for a cellular-level medical treatment is like using a sledgehammer for a job that requires a scalpel."

Peggy frowned. "Isn't there another tool you can use?"

Sarah nodded toward the ancient book. "That's what I've been researching. It's also possible to pull energy from my own body and channel it elsewhere. If I use that technique, I would be transferring our own dimension's power from one human to another, which means the energies involved are much more compatible."

"It's the magical equivalent of donating blood," Dave put in. "It weakens the donor, but it can save the patient's life."

"And once I've injected the serum into a patient and loosened their genetic structures," Sarah continued, "theoretically I could pour a portion of my personal energies inside them to direct them into triggering whatever physical changes they desire: repairing an organ defect or fighting a disease or whatever it is that needs treating."

"You'll _direct_ them? You mean, with telepathy?" Peggy asked, sounding startled.

Sarah shook her head in a quick negation. "I'm no Wanda Maximoff, and I don't think there's a spell in existence that could make me a telepath. This technique I'm studying, it's less of a mental exercise and more of a spiritual one. Spirit, or chi, or astral forms, whatever you want to call it. You know, the kinds of words that give most scientists the willies." She smiled briefly.

"What does Master Mahika think of this?" Steve asked.

"She was pretty concerned," Sarah admitted. "The Masters don't mess around with this technique very much. The danger with using personal energy is that if you accidentally transfer too much out of your own body-"

"-you run out of energy to sustain your own life," Steve finished, feeling a sudden surge of concern.

"Right. Although being what I am... I have more strength to give than most," Sarah said with characteristic understatement.

"But not an infinite amount."

"I'm being careful, Dad, I promise. Right now I'm just throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks. Do you want to see what I've got so far?"

Peggy and Steve exchanged glances, and then nodded.

Sarah stood up and moved away from the desk and settled into a relaxed stance, feet shoulder width apart and arms hanging loosely at her sides. Instinctively they all backed up and left a circle of space around her. Slowly, she lifted her hands up, keeping the palms down, and bent her knees slightly as she lowered her palms again. She took a smooth step to the side with one foot, and both arms came up again, this time in a graceful beckoning gesture. One motion flowed into the next in a long unbroken sequence, as she slowly turned, and stepped, and moved her arms through the air in gentle arcs with a relaxed expression on her face.

"Is that…?" Peggy began, tilting her head curiously.

"Tai chi," Bram confirmed quietly. "The philosophies are so similar… and we figured the Chinese wouldn't have been doing this for so many hundreds of years if there weren't something to it."

The longer Sarah continued her slow graceful motions, the deeper the serenity settled in her eyes… and her eyes seemed to be an even brighter shade of blue than usual despite the dim light down here, until suddenly Steve realized that her eyes were, in fact, _glowing_ blue, and that there were faint wisps of blue light beginning to curl up smoke-like from her fingertips. He took in a deep breath, fascinated, as her entire outline began to emit a faint glow. He'd seen this before, helping Wanda work to develop her powers, and yet in a way this was almost nothing like that. There was no fire and vim, no crackle of power on the cusp of exploding into action, only a silent serene light that seemed to _be_ more than _do_.

Slipping back into her original simple stance, Sarah then tipped her head back slowly, her arms fully extending outward as if in preparation for an embrace, and as abruptly as if it had been focused through a crystal, every particle of blue light surrounding her body coalesced into a pair of light beams shooting out of her shoulder blades, fanning upward and outward like two enormous wings. For one breathless moment it held, and then Sarah's hands swirled down into a new position in front of her belly, capturing the light and forming it into a brightly glowing ball of blue energy hovering inside her cupped hands, one on top, one below.

Sarah took a deep breath, holding it there for one long trembling moment, and then she began to move again, keeping her hands in cupping shape, holding the pulsing ball of energy, gently pushing it and pulling it and rolling it between her hands until, finally, she deliberately pushed it into her belly with a deep sigh of relief. The light faded as it was absorbed back into her body, and suddenly Sarah was her ordinary self again, breathing deeply, head bowed and eyes cast down. Dave hesitantly reached out and gripped her elbow, and she wobbled on her feet just a little before recovering her balance with Dave's support.

"I'm okay," she murmured, lifting her head up again and looking more alert. "It gets a little easier every time I try. I'm getting a better feel for my limits." She gazed at her parents, judging their reactions. "Are you two okay with this?" she asked them, a little hesitantly.

"I've seen magic before, honey," Steve said promptly, although seeing his own daughter lit up with energy from within was somehow stranger than seeing Wanda or the Masters of the Mystic Arts wield their powers. "And I'm so proud of you. I know you've been working hard."

"It's beautiful," Peggy said softly. "But I never saw Dr. Erskine doing anything like that to you," she added, glancing at Steve. "Did you?"

"No, I didn't," Steve admitted.

"He may have had ways to make you forget," Sarah said.

"Maybe he worked on you while you slept," Bram put in.

Sarah nodded. "Or maybe he enchanted the serum directly, before you were ever injected with it. Transferring personal energy into inanimate materials is much trickier, but he may have had no choice. It's not like he could have let anyone at the SSR see what he was _really_ doing."

Dave shook his head. "No wonder Dr. Erskine didn't put any of this in his notes. It wasn't just paranoia about the misuse of his research; he never would have gotten approval for a project like this if they'd known what it involved."

"That's true," Peggy admitted.

"The world wasn't ready for it," Sarah said.

"The world _still_ isn't ready for it," Peggy pointed out. "Even if you can get this to work, darling, you can't exactly get FDA approval to cast spells over sick people."

"One problem at a time," Dave said. "We still haven't figured out how to make the serum from scratch. Poor Dad here must be sick of getting poked with needles." He slapped Steve's back sympathetically.

"I don't mind," Steve said quickly, as he always did, but he knew Dave and Sarah worried about that anyway. Just then, the doorbell rang.

"That'll be Mike's family," Dave said, and he jogged back up the basement stairs to let them in.

"Meanwhile, we can't work out how to safely test any of this," Sarah continued. "Since the serum only works on someone with free will, animal testing is out. We haven't come up with anything yet."

"Is Dave learning how to do magic, too?" Steve asked.

Sarah shook her head, looking sober. "I've cut back on my hours so much while I figure all this out, Dave's almost supporting our family on his own now. He says that between his research at work and his research at home, he doesn't have time to tackle this, too."

"Is everything all right?" Peggy asked, brow knitted with concern.

"It's been a bit of an upheaval, but we'll adjust," Sarah said quietly. "We're both in agreement on how important this is, and that it's worth our family making some sacrifices to make it happen. Bram's taken a job now too, and that's been a help." Bram put his arm around his mother's shoulders and squeezed in a silent gesture of support. "And Maggie's been helping with the younger kids. Ever since she got her license she's even been able to drive them to lessons and things when my hands are too full." She blew out a long sigh. "I don't know what I'd do without her, to be honest."

"Honey!" Dave called from upstairs. "Everyone's here!"

"We'll be right up!" Sarah called back.

The four of them went up the stairs and joined the new arrivals... and there were enough of the family in the "Captain America Club" now that even Sarah's spacious and pleasant living room was in danger of overcrowding, although the five younger grandchildren had each been sent to a friend's house for the day. Steve offered the rocking chair to Peggy and then stood next to her, hand resting on the back of her chair, as everyone got settled in.

Mike and Tien sat on one couch, hands entwined, and their daughter Natty gracefully sank down next to her mother. Harrison started to move over to sit by his sister, but before he could Maggie darted in and squeezed in next to her cousin, the two girls linking arms and exchanging friendly smiles as they got comfortable.

Harrison shrugged and went over to sit by his cousin Bram instead, seated on the other couch with Dave and Sarah. The two boys were both so broad-shouldered that it was a tight fit, and Dave grimaced slightly and tried to move over to make a little more room for them. He had his arm around Sarah's shoulders; she still looked a little pale from her demonstration, or maybe it was just apprehension over the difficult conversation they were about to have with the children. Steve caught Peggy's eyes, and he knew she was apprehensive, too.

He took a deep breath, and began.

When everything had been explained to the four grandchildren, both about the fates of the Starks and the Decimation to come, and the shock had subsided and the questions had all been answered, there was a long silence.

It was Maggie who stirred first, and broke the silence.

"We should do something," she said quietly. "Something to help."

"Like we did with the Pyms," Natty agreed readily. "The way my family helped Hank and Hope when Janet disappeared. Maybe with Tony-"

Maggie frowned. "I was talking about the Decimation," she said.

Natty paused. "Oh."

"But yes, we should help the Starks too," Maggie quickly agreed.

"Well, what were _you_ thinking?" Natty asked her curiously.

"That's there's going to be far more than just one family broken when the Decimation comes," Maggie said. "A lot of kids are only going to have one parent left. Probably a lot of them won't have any parents at all. And if they don't have any extended family to take them in…" She trailed off, heartbreak in her eyes. "Our family is everything to me. I can't even imagine being alone in the world like that."

"It was a big problem," Steve agreed. "Nat… I mean, Natasha, Natasha Romanoff-" He'd learned to clarify that whenever his granddaughter Natty was in the room. "-she spent a lot of time and effort during the Decimation running the Orphan Relief Foundation. It was personal for her, and not just because she blamed herself for not being able to stop Thanos, although I think she did. Like the rest of us." He took a deep steadying breath. "Partly it was because she'd been an orphan herself, and partly because she couldn't have any children of her own, and I think… I think she thought of those kids as hers."

"I would want to help with something like that," Maggie said immediately.

"She had liaisons all over the world helping her," Steve said. He had often been in the room with Nat at New Avengers Headquarters when she had met with them remotely, training them and coordinating fundraising efforts, and had even spoken to a few of them himself when Nat had asked him to establish a program for psychological therapy services for the children. There had been a man overseeing the branches in Southeast Asia, a very young man to serve in a role like that, only in his 20s, but surprisingly self-assured. And there had been a woman heading up the European branches, a middle-aged woman who had impressed him with a nearly encyclopedic knowledge of the broken families under her jurisdiction. She had had difficulty holding back her tears as she had spoken of them.

Suddenly Steve stilled, remembering the woman's face on the screen, and not just the heartbreak in her eyes. Pale blue eyes, the color of the morning sky. Skin as fair as porcelain. Dark hair, with a gentle wave to it. Pretty, in a classic English-rose type of way. Yet she had spoken with an American accent, which had puzzled him a little at the time since she was based in London.

His eyes flicked back over to Maggie, and he had to fight to conceal his astonishment.

It was _her_.

The feeling that swept over him was indescribable. Maggie had looked different back then, of course — several decades older and not quite so willowy, and with her hair and clothing in the modern style — but the resemblance was undeniable. It was her. He had _spoken_ to her. For all the years of the Decimation she had been a support to Nat. Maybe even going so far as to be a friend to her, despite the ocean between them. And the whole time he had never known who and what she really was. He had spent very little time thinking of her at all, except during the few brief conversations they had shared, sticking to the business at hand. His enhanced memory had catalogued her face but failed to recognize its significance.

And the young man who headed the Southeast Asia branches of the Orphan Relief Foundation… hadn't he been Vietnamese? Was that only a coincidence? He had been the wrong age to be any of Steve's grandchildren. Maybe a great-grandchild, yet to be born?

What more had he missed? How much of this future life of his had intersected with his past? How many more of his descendants had he met and never known it?

"There's lots of time to get ready," Maggie was saying, and with an effort Steve forced himself to focus on the present day. "I bet there are lots of things we can do to help. At least... those of us who will be left." Her voice went a little fainter at the end.

"It won't just be the broken families," Bram agreed with his sister readily. "The economy would be a mess. Just the medical field alone… there would only be half as many doctors." He was planning on a medical career like his parents once he graduated from high school, and Steve wasn't surprised that his mind went there first.

"But only half as many patients," Harrison pointed out.

Bram shook his head. "It wouldn't work out evenly," he said. "There are relatively few doctors who specialize in any one thing. If you lose just a few specialists in any given area, there wouldn't be anyone available who could treat a particular condition. And considering how long it would take to train replacements… I mean, the Decimation would practically be over by the time they figured out how to adjust. But a lot of sick people would go untreated in the meantime." He frowned. "I'm not sure how we could fix that."

"We should focus on the more pressing problem," Harrison said with barely-concealed impatience. "That's all decades away. What about the Starks? Hydra has their number. What are we going to do for them?"

"And what can we do for Tony?" Natty added. "He shouldn't have to face this alone."

The four of them started batting ideas back and forth, and Steve looked down at Peggy to see her reaction. She was watching the grandchildren with a proud smile beginning to curve her lips, an expression that was mirrored perfectly by Sarah across the room. Mike caught Steve's eye and grinned openly in a way that clearly said: _We didn't even have to ask them to help._

They were still young, it was true, but they were good people, all of them, and as Steve looked from face to face, it dawned on him that for the first time in more years than he cared to count, he had more than just a family assembled in this room.

He had a team again.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** One of my reviewers asked me a while ago which actors I pictured portraying my original characters. It was a pretty intriguing question, and just for fun I worked up a list!_

_**Sarah:** Hayley Atwell as a blonde (see: Cinderella's mother in the 2015 live-action movie), although I imagined her hair not so long, and her body type as less willowy and more muscular_

_Her husband **Dave**: Sean Astin as he looked in "Rudy" (when I introduced him, anyway, although at this point in the story this character is approaching middle age)_

_Their son **Bram**: whoever plays the pallbearer standing behind Steve at Peggy's funeral in "Winter Soldier." I don't know the actor's name, but he sure resembles Chris Evans!_

_Their daughter **Maggie**: Anna Popplewell, who plays Susan in the Narnia movies_

_**Mike:** I'm so tempted to say Johnny Storm (i.e. Chris Evans in "Fantastic Four"). :-D But seriously, I've been picturing him as James Marsden, actually._

_His wife **Tien**: Hong Chau_

_Their daughter **Natty**: Pham Huong, Miss Vietnam 2015. (I hesitate to admit I'm picturing her as a beauty queen for fear people will think I'm making a Mary Sue. But her looks are relevant to the plot, as you will shortly see.)_

_Their son **Harrison**: Johnny Tri Nguyen (a Vietnamese actor/martial arts expert. Fun fact: he was a stuntman for Tobey Maguire in Spider-Man 2!)_

_I haven't done much character development for the younger grandkids yet. Maybe once I get to that point I'll think up actors for them, too._

_I'm curious to know how my readers have been picturing my OCs. Let me know in the comments, and/or leave a review for this chapter!_


	16. Chapter 16

**April 1991**

The Starks lived in the Old Westbury village situated on the north shore of Long Island, a richly wooded area that was frequently referred to as "America's Millionaire Capitol" due to the concentration of fabulously wealthy families who lived within its borders.

It was home to only 4,000 people; most of the founding residents were old-money families like the Vanderbilts, although over the last 50 years more and more businessmen, industrialists and entertainers had began to set up their new-money mansions there.

"A _fox hunting_ park?" Tien said in disbelief as she looked out the window at the scenery passing by. "In New York?"

"If you really want to be amazed, try counting the number of country clubs we pass," Peggy said, pulling to a stop at a red light. "There seem to be enough on Long Island for each family to have their own."

Expression sinking, Tien reached up and fiddled uncomfortably with the pearl necklace she was wearing. "I won't fit in here."

"Of course you will," Peggy said briskly. "You've been just as rich as them, for just as long."

Tien laughed with an obvious ring of skepticism.

"Well, if _you_ don't believe it, they won't," Peggy said. "You can do this, Tien. I'm really hoping Maria will respond to you the way she never would for me. I think perhaps I was just too thoroughly middle class for her tastes. I've always been a working woman, after all."

"And when I was young, back in Vietnam, so was I," Tien said. "I don't know rich-people manners."

"You look the part, and you're going to be making a generous donation to the cause," Peggy said with a confidence Tien didn't feel. " And you have one other advantage: Any eccentricities in your manners will be attributed to your foreignness, not your social class. Just… play up your accent."

"You're foreign, too," Tien pointed out.

"A boring old Englishwoman?" Peggy said, shooting Tien an amused smile. "Not nearly foreign enough. And the Starks know English eccentricities like the back of their hands. Their butler, Edwin Jarvis, was with them for many years."

"He isn't there any more?"

"He's older than I am," Peggy said. "Late seventies, now. He's retired to England." She could not quite conceal a longing expression on her face, one Tien understood all too well. They both loved their lives in America, but there was always a hunger for home.

They stopped at a gate that blocked a tree-lined lane curving up through the trees, and Peggy handed her identification to the man in the little booth.

"Peggy Carter, director of S.H.I.E.L.D.," she said.

After a short wait, he handed her card back and opened the gate. Peggy drove around the bend, and as they emerged from the stand of trees, the Stark mansion came into view.

"Oh," Tien breathed, craning her neck to get a proper look at it. It was located at the crest of a hill, providing it with an excellent view of the golf courses and the greenery of the neighboring mansions. Tall white columns framed the heavy wooden double doors at the entrance, and the fan-shaped stained glass above sparkled in the afternoon sun. Turrets and gables topped the two-story stone structure, and the landscaping around the house was artfully arranged and immaculately trimmed.

There were quite a few other cars already parked there as they pulled into the gravel loop in front of the home; they had aimed to be fashionably late.

"I'll let you go in first," Peggy said as she turned off the engine. "Remember, we don't know each other. And don't worry, Tien. You're going to do great."

Tien got out of the car, moving carefully in her heels and her fine silk skirt, and swished up to the front door.

Her knock was answered promptly, and an assistant welcomed her warmly, took down her name and accepted her donation, and then poured her a drink before showing her into the next room, which was lit by beautiful chandeliers and filled with laughing, chatting people dressed in finery. Tien was relieved to see that the clothing Peggy had gotten her did not look out of place here, but for an uncomfortably long moment she stood there awkwardly, not sure what to do next, painfully aware that she was at a party where she knew literally no one.

But almost immediately there was a man in a suit at her elbow, an older man with white hair and a mustache who nevertheless moved with a surprising spryness. "Welcome to our home," he said to her. "Thank you for your generous donation, and believe me, the foundation will make good use of it. We're glad you could come."

"Mr. Stark?" she said, easily recognizing him and hoping she sounded more cool than she felt. "Tien Nguyen. This is a beautiful party, as nice as the one you threw in Malibu, back in… what was it? 1973 perhaps?" She frowned a little, as if unsure. "You remember me, I hope? I certainly remember you." She played up her accent like Peggy had suggested, although she felt strangely stilted, trying to speak more formally than she ever had back home.

"Yeah, sure," Howard said, shaking Tien's hand, although he could not possibly remember her. "The San Francisco Nguyens, right? All that real estate around the bay? Nice to see you again." Luckily for them, he met a lot of people in his line of work, far too many to be able to remember every face or name. "How's business?"

"Business is booming," Tien said. "And for you, too, I think? We cannot open a trade magazine without seeing your name."

"Oh, I'm doing all right for myself," Howard said, and then he stretched out his arm, beckoning to someone behind her. "Ms. Nguyen, I'd like you to meet my wife, Maria. She's done all the work for this little bash. The foundation is her baby."

Maria Stark joined them, dressed in a mint green blouse and white silk blazer with a matching skirt, her pale blonde hair pulled back into a low bun, with a few uncurled tendrils escaping to brush her cheeks. She looked carelessly elegant, moving with a slow deliberateness as she reached out to shake Tien's hand.

"Tien Nguyen," Howard told her. "The real estate folks in old San Fran."

"Oh yes," Maria said warmly. "It's a pleasure to meet you. Thank you for coming, and thank you for your donation."

"My family has always been very concerned about educational matters," Tien said.

"So has mine," Maria said, smiling. "And this is one cause very near and dear to my heart. As a child I had dyslexia myself, but I was lucky enough to have parents who could afford private tutors for me. Not every child has that. I started the foundation to help those who didn't."

"It is a wonderful cause. And you have a wonderful home. Very beautiful."

"Excuse me, ladies," Howard said, and they both glanced at him as he left them and moved toward the foyer, where Peggy had just entered the room and was scanning the crowd with a practiced eye. Tien glanced away quickly, feigning indifference. Maria held eye contact with Peggy for just a moment, nodding coolly, and then she deliberately turned her back on them and resumed talking to Tien.

"Would you like a tour of my home?" she asked.

"Yes, very much, thank you."

* * *

"Peggy Carter." Howard's eyes moved up and down, pausing on the slight bulge under the left side of her blazer. "Only you would bring a gun to a party."

"I'm not here for the party, Howard," she said crisply. "I'm here to see you."

He laughed, a single bark. "And why is the gun here?"

"It's here to see anyone who has less than friendly plans for me or for you. As always."

"Well, thank goodness you're here," he said with a hint of sarcasm. "All my security teams with all their guns… they just aren't adequate for my needs. I feel so much safer with _your_ gun in the room."

"As well you should," she said, and she smiled pertly as she met Howard's eyes. He smiled back despite a half-hearted attempt to resist, showing a flash of teeth beneath his mustache. Despite their frequent differences of opinion and occasional bouts of open hostility to each other, they never could manage to stay genuinely angry with each other for long.

"I suppose you're here for business purposes," he said then, with weary inevitability. "You always want to talk business at parties."

"You don't give me much choice, Howard, considering you're nearly always at a party."

Howard gestured toward a doorway into a nearby unoccupied room, a smaller one dominated by a baby grand piano and lit with sunlight diffused through white curtains hanging over the tall windows. "Fine. Let's talk. Unless you'd rather drink. I know which one _I'd_ prefer."

Peggy smiled a little knowingly. "Let's talk."

* * *

"And that's the master suite," Maria said, closing the door as they came out of it. "Down this hall here are the guest bedrooms."

Tien paused in the hallway, looking at the framed photographs on the wall. One of them showed Maria standing next to a young girl wearing a jockey helmet, perched on a horse. Another showed Maria with her arm around a blonde boy who was about 10 years old, both of them smiling and posing in front of the Meadow Brook Polo Club.

"Are these your children?" Tien asked politely.

Maria hesitated for a moment. "I'm never sure how to answer that," she admitted. "They were my first husband's children, from _his_ first marriage. Their mother moved to the Riviera after the divorce and didn't visit often. The children were small enough that they didn't remember her much. So for as long as the marriage lasted, I was their mother."

She pointed at the girl. "This is Tiffany. She loved riding horses. She would have ridden them all day, every day, I think, if she could have gotten away with it." She smiled fondly, remembering. "And that's Jack. He was a charmer, that one. Always getting into little scrapes — nothing too bad, really — and then smiling at me so innocently that it was hard to punish him." She sighed a little. "Of course, they're both all grown up now."

"Are they here?" Tien asked curiously, glancing back over the balcony at the party below.

"No." Maria's eyes suddenly moistened. "They... don't keep in contact anymore, I'm sorry to say." She blinked rapidly a few times and then cleared her throat swiftly. "And this is a workshop," she pressed on with the tour in a rush, gesturing at the next door down. "Or one of them, anyway. We have quite a few. That's the price I paid for marrying a tinkerer… and then giving birth to one." She didn't sound like she minded in the slightest. The door to the workshop was ajar, and they paused in the hallway to look in.

The room wasn't unoccupied. A young man with dark hair was sitting with his back to the door, hunched over a bank of electronic controls, making delicate adjustments to the row of sliders. He didn't turn around; there were headphones covering his ears and he seemed to be unaware of their presence.

"My son, Tony," Maria said with obvious pride.

Tien looked at him with interest bordering on fascination. So this was the man destined to defeat Thanos. It seemed unbelievable; he was so young, for one thing, only 19 or 20. But more importantly, there was nothing about Tien's life of peace and plenty with the Carters here in America that had ever primed her to fear a disaster as world-altering as the Decimation... although she knew her father-in-law well enough by now to trust in everything he said.

She knew she should be frightened of it, knew she should be aching inside to find a way to thank Tony for the sacrifice he would one day make, but it all seemed so distant, so unreal. And anytime Tien thought about what might happen to her children on that day, she felt a curious sense of blankness inside. Her own mind protecting her from the horror. It was a blessing she wasn't ready to give up yet.

"This is just how Howard looked the first time I saw him," Maria said softly, looking at Tony's back with a smile touching her pink-painted lips. "The day I fell in love with him. I was invited to the private opening reception for one of his World Expos. He started to welcome me, and then he noticed that one of the animatronic displays at the entrance had broken down. Howard didn't even hesitate. Just dove right in with both hands to fix it. I don't think it occurred to him to call on one of his people to do it. He got grease on his Armani suit, but I don't think he even noticed. I've never seen anyone concentrate so hard on something. He was completely absorbed. Like there was nothing in the world but him and that machine." She smiled deeply, remembering. "Tony comes by his obsessions honestly."

She walked into the room and reached out, lifting one of the earphones off Tony's ear. He turned toward her, startled for a moment, and then smiled widely when he saw who it was. "Hi, Mom."

"Hi, sweetheart. What are you listening to?"

"Static," Tony answered promptly, pushing the headphones down around his neck and giving an incurious glance at Tien still standing at the doorway. "Nothing but a whole lot of static."

Maria ran her eyes over the bank of controls, which had wires of all colors crisscrossing something that Tien thought looked like the motherboard Mike had once pulled out of their malfunctioning computer in an attempt to see if anything had shaken loose. There were tools scattered all over the worktable, and the smell of hot solder lingered in the air.

"What are you building?" Maria asked him curiously.

Tony smiled briefly. "Don't want to say. At least not until I can get it to work. I kinda want to surprise Dad."

"All right." Maria stroked his hair affectionately. "Can I bring you something? A drink or some food? There's plenty downstairs."

"No thanks, Mom. I just need to focus on this for a while. I think I've almost got it."

"Okay. Good luck, sweetie." Maria put the headphones back on his ears for him and then leaned over to kiss the top of his head before turning to leave. He leaned forward to flip a switch, already focused on his work again.

"Bingo!" they heard Tony burst out triumphantly just as Maria closed the door behind her, and the two women were once again alone in the hallway.

"He looks like a hard worker," Tien said.

"He is," Maria agreed readily. "Oh, but he isn't all hard work, though. He makes friends very easily. You should see him when he's at a party!"

* * *

"I'll cut straight to the point," Peggy said once Howard had closed the double doors behind them, shutting out the music and the chatter of the party, and they had settled onto the couch by the piano. "I want to talk to you about the new project you're working on. The super-soldier serum. And please don't waste your breath trying to deny it."

Howard raised his graying eyebrows and then abruptly stood up again, shoving one fist into his pocket and turning slightly away from her.

"Does it ever gall you, Peggy?" he asked then, in a voice that was a little too casual. "Constantly spying on your own friends?"

"Believe it or not, this wasn't information I went looking for," Peggy said calmly. "It quite literally fell into my lap. Have you considered the possibility that your security is not as good as you think it is?"

"Don't insult my intelligence," Howard said, turning back toward her. "I learned my lesson after that little incident with the Tesseract. It's early days on this project. I only have a few assistants, and none of them even know what the goal is; I'm doing the heavy lifting by myself. Carson Mitchell's people can sniff around all they want. They're not taking this from me." His determination was fierce. "How did you hear about it?"

"I looked into a crystal ball."

He scoffed. "That's cute."

Peggy regarded him soberly. "Why the serum, Howard? Why now?"

Howard shrugged one shoulder and turned away from her.

"What else am I supposed to do with my time?" he asked, brushing an imaginary speck of dust off the piano. "You took the Tesseract away from me."

"You don't need the Tesseract, _or_ the serum," Peggy said. "There are a thousand other inventions you could be working on. I've seen your working files, remember? It isn't as though you have a shortage of ideas."

"This is the only one that matters."

"Why? Biochemistry isn't even your strong suit."

"Yeah, I know. All I'm good for is building weapons."

"That is _not_ what I-" Peggy began vehemently.

"Think about it, Peggy!" Howard suddenly barked, a flush rising in his face. "Project Rebirth is the only project I ever worked on that _saved_ more lives than it destroyed! Instead of prolonging a war, he actually succeeded in _ending_ it!"

"Howard, you've done more of worth in your life than just Project Rebirth, and not all of it was weapons," Peggy said firmly. "What about your Jitterbug? Your repulsors, your lasers? Not to mention your expo and everything that's come out of that. And what about your son, Tony? He has your genius. He could do great things one day. That's hardly nothing."

"Yeah, he's going to turn out just like his old man," Howard said bitterly. "Chasing women, drinking booze, and creating weapons of mass destruction. Did you see the senior project he came up with at MIT? He wants to incorporate my repulsor technology into _MIRV missiles_." Howard laughed bitterly. "What a waste."

"Is that all you see when you look at him?" Peggy asked, frowning. "He's very clever. He's a hard worker. He-"

"Yeah, I know that's all _you_ see when _you_ look at him," Howard said pointedly. "But you haven't seen Tony at his best. You haven't seen the strings of beautiful girls he goes through like tissues. You haven't been with me when I've come home to find the floor covered in red Solo cups and Tony and all his friends passed out on the couches. The last time I blew my top about that, he finally wised up and started doing it at other people's houses instead of mine. But word gets around." He fixed Peggy with an accusing glare. "And don't you dare say hypocrite."

"I wasn't going to say that," Peggy said.

"Even when I was doing all that, I was just-" Howard's usual verbosity seemed to fail him, and he searched for the words for a long time before he finally gave up with a deep sigh that was almost a growl.

"You don't owe me an explanation," Peggy said gently. Whether Howard remembered or not, he had already explained it to her many years ago, in a rare moment of naked candor. He'd been drunk, of course. At that stage when his tongue had been set loose and all kinds of things came tumbling out without his usual ego-cushioning filter. How his brain subjected him to a continual torrent of ideas, theories, and worries; a tormenting, never-ending stream of consciousness that could only be brought to order through long, intense work sessions… unless he shut it off entirely with alcohol, that is.

But even then, he had confessed to her that night with reddened, exhausted eyes, the relief never lasted long.

"Perhaps Tony is doing those things for the same reason you did," Peggy pointed out. "Have you ever given _him_ an explanation?"

"I tried." Howard gestured helplessly. "But it just turns into a shouting match. He doesn't want to hear anything from the old man. And now he's turning into the one thing I didn't want him to turn into: _me_."

"He's young," Peggy said. "He could change. _You_ did."

"Fat lot of good it did me." Howard shook his head wearily. "No, Tony's a lost cause, along with most of the other things I wasted my life on." Then he looked up, his expression clearing. "But the serum, now… that's different."

"Is _that_ what this is about?" Peggy asked, trying to follow his train of thought. "You think that if you succeed with the serum, it will somehow make up for-"

"Look, I'm just trying to finish the job the SSR hired me to do 50 years ago," Howard interrupted. "Remember Colonel Phillips' dream? How he wanted a whole army of super soldiers to fight the battles that ordinary men couldn't? How disappointed he was when all he got was one?" Howard threw his arms out expansively, a flash of his old boyish enthusiasm sparking in his eyes. "And look what Steve Rogers managed to do anyway, just by himself! Imagine what a handful of men like him could do!"

Peggy looked at him in disbelief. "So instead of making mechanical weapons, you're going to make _human_ ones?"

"Is that how you thought of Steve?" Howard shot back.

She straightened up indignantly. "You know it isn't."

"Then don't insult me by suggesting it about _my_ project."

Peggy sighed deeply. She held out a hand. "Come sit down, Howard."

He didn't budge, standing there stiffly, while the music of the party outside played faintly in the background.

"_Please_, Howard," she said. "Come and sit down with me."

Finally, he relented, and looked at her expectantly with his eyebrows raised as if to say, "Well?"

"If you care about your family, and I know you do," Peggy said gently, "then you won't endanger your son or your wife by continuing this project. Dr. Erskine was killed for his research, remember?"

Howard didn't answer.

A flush touched Peggy's cheeks. "For God's sake, Howard!" she burst out. "You are putting yourself and your family's lives at risk! Just drop it. _Please_."

Howard was scrutinizing her with a cynical smile she didn't like. "While I appreciate your concern for my family, are you sure that's the only reason you're here?"

Peggy was taken aback. "Why else would I be?"

Howard smirked. "Don't play innocent with me, Peggy. The masked man who was leading your little band of adventurers when they rescued the Tesseract? The one pulling off Steve Rogers-style maneuvers?" Howard emphasized the last few words heavily. "You sure you didn't come here just to scare off your competition?"

Peggy stared at him blankly. "What?"

"You're gotten even farther along than I have. A human subject already? Not bad, Peggy. Not bad at all. He didn't seem _quite_ as strong as Cap, but still… close enough for horseshoes and hand grenades, right?" Howard pushed up the cuff of his suit and casually checked the time on his gold watch. "My formula, on the other hand, is going to be _more_ potent than Erskine's, not less. You should have waited and worked with me. I've already got interested parties at the Pentagon. I doubt they'll be interested in your variant once they've seen mine in action."

Peggy's face had slowly settled into a seething fury. "How dare you?" she asked through clenched teeth. "When have I ever done anything that I did for my _own_ glory?"

"I guess there's a first time for everything."

"Whatever it is you thought you saw, it wasn't that," she said tightly. "I haven't developed a super-soldier serum. And even if I could, I wouldn't. There's a reason why there's only ever been one Captain America, Howard: there was only ever one Steve Rogers. We can't recreate him, nor should we try. Just…" Her voice turned pleading. "Let him _go_."

Howard smiled humorlessly. "Says the woman who still keeps his picture on her desk."

"I got married, Howard," Peggy said more quietly, having regained her control. "I had children. I'm happy. You have a family too. Maybe it doesn't feel like you're saving the world, not in the sort of way we did during the war, but it's no less valid. Be content with it."

"Speaking of which," Howard said, "when are you going to come clean about your family?"

She frowned. "_My_ family?"

"How is it that after all these years I've never met your husband?" There was a challenge in Howard's eye. "I mean, I know you're a spy and all, and keeping secrets comes as naturally to you as breathing, but this is really taking it to the extreme, Peggy."

A frown touched her brow. "It's for my family's protection. You know that."

"Protection from what? _Me_?" Howard scoffed. "Peggy, I have to admit, there are days when I wonder if there even _is_ a Mr. Carter."

Peggy's eyes flashed with indignation. "Don't be crude, Howard. Do I really strike you as the sort of woman who would raise her children fatherless on _purpose_?"

"No," Howard admitted, "but you also didn't seem like the kind of woman who would go merrily off to work every day and leave her children to be raised by a _man_-" he chuckled humorlessly "-given how singularly unsuited for the job we are."

"You give your sex too little credit," Peggy said. "My husband is a good father… and so are you, no matter what you may think. I know you have regrets, Howard, and I'm no prophet, but I dare say that one day, Tony will remember the good times more than anything else."

"We were talking about your family, not mine," he said with a hint of frost.

"My family thinks of your family as family."

"They don't even know us."

"You're wrong," Peggy said softly.

"Yeah," Howard agreed with a heavy dose of sarcasm. "I'm always wrong. About everything. Just ask my son."

* * *

"I can't physically stop Howard from doing this," Peggy told Steve after she got home that night and recounted the conversation to him over dinner. Now she grabbed a couple of containers and started moving the leftovers into them. "And I don't think I can dissuade him, either. He's decided that this project is going to make up for all his earlier missteps. It's personal for him now."

"The money and the glory wouldn't hurt, either," Steve said, putting the lids on the leftovers and taking them to the refrigerator.

"No," Peggy admitted, looking troubled. "I'm sure he's thought of that, too. This is Howard we're talking about. But I think…" She slowed her words, thinking carefully. "I think he's _trying_ to do it for the right reason. I have to give him credit for that. I wish I could have seen this version of Howard 20 years ago, to be honest. He's getting better all the time. It infuriates me to think that _now_, of all times-" She cut herself off before she could sink into despair again. It wouldn't help the situation. She sighed deeply and then started gathering the dirty dishes from the table.

"If we can't or won't stop him from making the serum," Steve said, opening the dishwasher and taking the dirty plates from her to load, "we may be able to change _how_ he does it."

Peggy nodded, looking grateful for the new direction of the conversation. "I've been thinking about his security. He might let me give him advice in that way. I think he's on the right track with compartmentalization. If I can persuade him not to let any of his assistants know the entire process from beginning to end… maybe even tell him to completely replace his teams from time to time, so that even if a Hydra agent does make their way inside, they won't be able to get much..."

"I think that's a good idea," Steve said.

"But I have a severe shortage of personnel I can offer for the cause," Peggy said, looking worried. "There are so few people left at S.H.I.E.L.D. that I'm certain can be trusted. There are people around me starting to put on the pressure. They want me to retire. They want me out. Even some of the Council members now."

"Well, Hydra may not know exactly what you've been doing all these years to fight them," Steve said, grabbing a washcloth to wipe the table, "but they definitely know you're not on their side. Replacing you with just about anyone would help them sleep better at night."

"I'm doing what I can to advance Robert Keller," Peggy said. "He isn't the ideal replacement for me, but he's the best I can come up with. At least, the best replacement that I think the Council will accept. I'm confident he isn't Hydra, but he's so… corporate-minded. He never saw a length of red tape he didn't like. It's a shame I couldn't hand the reins directly to Fury."

"He isn't ready for that."

"I know," Peggy said softly. "I feel bad for him. Caught in a tug-of-war between us and Alexander Pierce, whether he knows it or not. He'll probably rue the day he left the CIA for S.H.I.E.L.D." They'd been doing everything in their power to surround Fury with people they hoped would be a good influence on him — not only Phil Coulson, but others as well. They both knew the results would be mixed; by the time Fury rescued Steve from the ice, he would already be living in a morally gray universe. But that was better than letting Pierce have Fury all to himself. At least their growing friendship would result in Fury's elevation to director in the years to come… and Fury was not going to be as amenable to Pierce's plans as the undersecretary hoped.

"At least Mike will be around after I leave, to keep that up," Peggy added as she grabbed the tablecloth to spread on the now-clean table. After a lot of soul-searching, Mike was on the cusp of asking to be reassigned as a trainer rather than an active-duty agent. Partly it was because there were people at S.H.I.E.L.D. who had realized by now that whoever Agent 45 was, he was a reliable lackey for Director Carter, and he was bound to be pushed out of the prime assignments the moment she retired.

But it was more than that. Both Steve and Peggy knew what was really on his mind: soon Clint Barton would be applying as an agent. And after that, Maria Hill. As a trainer, Mike would be well-placed to influence them before anyone else at S.H.I.E.L.D. got ahold of them. He'd take the competence and idealism and good-heartedness that they brought with them, and he'd polish it to a high shine.

They had the advantage of knowing that the future of S.H.I.E.L.D. did not lie in the hands of Robert Keller or Alexander Pierce.

"Are you ready for this?" Steve asked Peggy, and she paused in the act of putting the floral centerpiece back on the table. "Are you ready to leave?"

Peggy took a long moment to answer, adjusting one of the roses in the vase even though it was already perfectly placed. "You know," she said slowly, "for a long time I couldn't quite understand it when _you_ retired. You just… walked away from it all. Got in a time machine and came back home to me without a backward glance. You've been a fighter your whole life; I'd have thought that you would have be dragged away from the fight, kicking and screaming."

"There was a time when I probably would have," he admitted.

Peggy nodded. "But I understand now. You didn't really give up the fight at all. You just started fighting it in a different way. And you did it in a way that… made you more _whole_ than how you were fighting before. Until you came back home to me, I had never seen a Steve Rogers that gave any consideration to his own happiness. And do you know, I actually prefer you this way. You never smiled much during the war. You smile now. And I like seeing you smile."

"You give me all my reasons to smile."

"As much as I hate to admit it," Peggy continued, "I'm beginning to feel my age. I... get tired so easily now."

"I know. I'm feeling it, too." The serum might keep him stronger and healthier than other men his age, but it wasn't stopping him from aging. He had just as many wrinkles as Peggy did… and he no longer had to look closely to spot the gray hairs in the mirror.

"There are days when I have this suspicion," Peggy went on, "that staying home and giving advice to Mike or Sarah about their work, or having long talks with the grandkids about what they want to do and who they want to be when they grow up, or writing my memoirs the way Tien keeps telling me to do, might do the world just as much good as going to work and putting out yet another bureaucratic brushfire."

"It would probably make you smile more, too," Steve quipped.

"I certainly hope so." She smiled at him then, and the dimple popped out; she was just as beautiful to him now as she had ever been, no matter how many wrinkles she had. "And I miss home, to be honest. I've been over here far longer than I ever lived in England, but… it's in my veins. I miss it. I want my cottage and my rose garden. I want to see my parents for as long as I still have them. I can't get overseas for many visits, and they're getting so frail." She sighed deeply, and her shoulders sagged at the thought.

"You'll have all of that. Soon. I promise."

He didn't have to say it, but she knew what he meant. Not until after December 16th.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** In the Marvel movies, the character of Maria Stark is a bit of a blank spot in Tony's back story. Tony obviously loved her deeply and was hit pretty hard by her death, judging by his reaction to learning the truth about the way she died: he seems to be even angrier about her death than his dad's. He also doesn't seem to have the same kind of conflicted feelings about her that he does about Howard._

_But we really know almost nothing about her, and given her importance to Tony I wish we had gotten at least a few hints that could have answered questions such as: What kind of woman would inspire Howard to commit to a marriage after so many years of womanizing? Why did Howard choose to have a child with her when he apparently feels out of his element as a father? And why was she in the car the night the Winter Soldier attacked? Did she know the serum was in the car? Or did she die simply because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time and the Winter Soldier was told "no witnesses?"_

_For this chapter and the upcoming ones, I've taken what little information there is about Maria and tried to expand it in a way that makes sense and is emotionally compelling. Let me know what you think as it unfolds._


	17. Chapter 17

**June 1991**

Tien visited Old Westbury regularly now, to see Maria Stark. As Peggy had hoped, Maria responded to Tien much more warmly than she ever had to Peggy… but not because of the class differences as Peggy had always believed, as it turned out.

After several months, Maria confided to Tien how uncomfortable she got meeting Howard's various old flames, who had a habit of turning up from time to time in their exclusive social circle. Apparently she went out of her way to avoid them, Tien explained to Peggy when she stopped at their house afterward to make her report.

"But I'm _not_ an old flame," Peggy said, startled, but Tien shook her head. "How would she know that?" she asked reasonably. "You knew Howard when he was young and single. You worked with him closely, and still do. And you're very pretty. You can't blame Maria for making the assumption."

"That's not to say Howard didn't try a time or two," Peggy admitted. "But he isn't remotely my type."

Tien smiled. "We all know what your type is."

"Well, now I feel awful," Peggy said, her smile fading. "I never knew Maria felt that way. She must get worried every time I go see Howard."

Lately that had been often, too. Howard — sometimes gratefully, and sometimes reluctantly — was letting Peggy advise him on security matters. He had already completely replaced his research team once, with plans to do so again soon… and none of his assistants had been given access to the full process of serum development. Each one knew only a single step, with no explanation as to the ultimate goal. It was a testament to how seriously Howard took the situation when he did not even tell Peggy where he was keeping the raw materials, or how he was using them in the lab.

Steve and Peggy were both more than a little curious about it, although they respected Howard's wishes and didn't attempt to find out through underhanded ways. Whatever Howard was coming up with, they knew it was going to bear more resemblance to the formula Arnim Zola had given to Bucky than to Erskine's formula, which had triggered such dynamic changes for Johann Schmidt and Steve, and ultimately for Bruce Banner and Emil Blonsky, whose treatments had been derived from Steve's blood samples.

"Howard's so determined to top Erskine, but he's going to make the serum too strong," Peggy said with a worried frown one night. "Those other Winter Soldiers… they went mad almost immediately, didn't they?"

"That's what Bucky said," Steve agreed. "And it's a good thing, too. They were too unstable for Hydra to use. That's why they were put on ice."

"I don't quite understand that," Peggy confessed. "From everything Howard's told me… he's being extremely cautious. Perhaps more cautious than he's ever been with a project before. How could he have botched it so badly?"

Steve shook his head. "I don't know."

"Has it ever occurred to you," Peggy said suddenly, her eyes hollow, "that far from helping Howard, we're actually creating the conditions that will lead to his death?"

"Why would you say that?" Steve said, startled.

Peggy shook her head slowly. "Look at it this way. In the past Hydra was content to hang back and let Howard work on the Tesseract, or try to replicate Hank Pym's work, without threatening him in any way. Now that he's being so careful… we're forcing their hand, aren't we? They aren't going to be able to steal his work through subterfuge. They'll be left with no choice but to attack him openly."

"What could we do differently?" Steve said reasonably. "We can't just sit back and let them take it from him. We're protecting Howard and his interests. With Howard's cooperation. He doesn't want Hydra stealing the formula any more than we do, and he knows the risk he's taking."

He covered Peggy's hand with his. "All we can do is what we think is right," he continued. "Howard will do that, too. And Hydra will do what Hydra always does. Don't say they're left with no choice. They have as much choice as anyone. And if they choose violence, they'll answer for it. They'll answer to _us_."

"Not Bucky," Peggy said with a sudden passion.

"Not Bucky," he agreed. "His handlers."

"Fury has Pierce's number," Peggy said with a grim kind of satisfaction. "Though it will have to wait a while. And as for Pierce's underlings…. they won't escape justice."

Steve narrowed his eyes. "We'll be there to give it to them."

* * *

**September 1991**

"I miss him terribly."

A glass of lemonade in her motionless hand, Maria Stark stared at the row of trees at the edge of the country club's green expanse, although she seemed too distracted to be admiring the beginning of the autumn changes to the fluttering leaves.

"Tony?" Tien said knowingly as she pulled her sweater more securely over her shoulders; it was starting to feel a little cool outside, even in the relative shelter of the country club's gazebo.

"I can't believe he's been gone this long," Maria said quietly. "He's been jetting around the world since he graduated from MIT — always some place to go or someone to see — but he usually comes home every few months, or talks us into coming to see him, wherever he is. He's been away since March now, and every time I suggest that we come see him, he tries to talk me out of it."

"Maybe he's distracted by a girl," Tien suggested.

Maria dismissed that with a wave of her hand. "He always tells me about the girls. He hasn't gotten serious with any of them. I don't think that's it."

"You think something's wrong?"

Maria put down the lemonade untouched, looking troubled. "I don't know. He left so suddenly. One minute he was planning to stay here in New York at least a month, and then the next — the day after my fundraiser, in fact, the day you and I met — he suddenly decided to go to Japan."

"Why?"

Maria shrugged one shoulder gracefully. "The CEO of Matsushita had invited him to tour their facilities months earlier, and at the time he didn't seem too excited about it. I guess he changed his mind. He just seemed a little moody when he told me he was going. I tried to find out what was bothering him — usually he tells me everything — but he didn't want to talk."

"He's a young man. It's a trying time of life," Tien said, trying to sound comforting. "My son is a little younger than yours, and I never can predict when he'll have his next mood swing."

Maria shook her head again. "Something felt different. And when he went from there to India, and then to the Netherlands, and never said a word about coming home? I'm afraid-" She stopped, a sudden hitch in her voice, and it took a while for her to resume. "I'm afraid it's happening again. That something I said, something I did… Or _didn't_ do…" She trailed off.

"What do you mean?" Tien asked softly, reaching out to put a hand on Maria's wrist.

"My other children," Maria explained after a beat. "My first husband's children, the ones I helped raise. I think I told you once that they didn't keep in contact anymore."

"Yes."

"My ex turned them against me," Maria blurted out in a rush, her usual stately way of speaking falling by the wayside. "At least… that's what I told myself for years. I was furious with him for taking them away from me. But that wasn't really it… or at least, that wasn't only it. He had a hand in it, but it was my fault, too. I… I..." A tear rolled down her cheek, and quickly Tien pulled a handkerchief out of her purse and handed it to Maria, who dabbed at her eyes carefully.

"I had so much going on in my life," Maria explained tearfully. "My music… you know how I love my music. And my foundation. All the fundraisers, and the networking, and the meet and greets for my husband's business… I had so much to do. And you're a mother, you know how it is. How tempting it is to call in the nanny for everything. How easy it is."

Tien wisely said nothing; she had often thanked her lucky stars that Mike was able to earn enough that she could stay home with the children, but they had certainly never hired a nanny. One of the best parts of being in the Carter family was how close they all were, and not just geographically: She and Sarah traded for child care when they needed it, and Mike's dad was almost always available to help, too.

"I know they weren't really my children, but I _did_ love them," Maria continued with an aching plea in her eyes.

"I'm sure you did," Tien said quickly.

"I just… didn't know how to show it to them in a way they would understand." Maria shook her head slowly. "I practically let the nanny raise them. I don't know why I was so surprised that my ex was able to poison them against me. They didn't know me as I really was. They didn't know how much I loved them. How could they?"

"Motherhood seems to come with a heaping helping of guilt, Maria," Tien said gently. "You don't need to pile more on yourself. None of us are perfect at it. None of us could be."

Maria nodded. "I know. I try not to dwell on it, but it still hurts sometimes. I suppose that's a good thing. It's why I was so careful with Tony when he came along. I was determined not to make the same mistake. And so I gave him everything. Everything I didn't give the others. I'm not talking about the money," she added quickly. "I'm talking about my time. My attention. I gave it all to him. I went to every school event. If he needed a ride to a robotics competition, I drove him myself. Whenever he talked, I really listened. I didn't just love him at arm's length, I made sure he _knew_ that I loved him."

"I'm sure he does know that."

Maria drew in a shaky breath. "That's why it makes me so nervous, how distant Tony's been lately. I can't help but wonder if I missed something, if I pushed him away somehow without meaning to."

"I'm sure you didn't." Tien hesitated, and then said cautiously: "But from what you've said, isn't it Howard he doesn't always get along with?"

Maria nodded, looking suddenly weary. "They've been at each other's throats these last few years. It's because they're too alike. They're both… so much larger than life. Sometimes there just isn't enough room in the house for the both of them. But Howard insists he didn't have a fight with Tony that day he decided to go to Japan. I can't explain it. Something got under Tony's collar, but I don't know what."

"Maybe you could surprise him with a visit," Tien said after a long silence. "I'm sure once you were there, he would be glad to see you."

"I don't think I could pull Howard away," Maria said, shaking her head slowly. "He's fixated on a project right now, and his attention is almost impossible to divert when he gets like that. With the Starks, it's all or nothing, and right now, he's giving his all."

"What kind of project?" Tien asked curiously.

"You'll see soon enough," Maria said with a sudden uplift of her chin and the stirrings of a proud smile. "He's hoping to be done by Christmas. And then the whole world will see."

"It's a big project?"

"The biggest," Maria said, a spark of excitement in her usually tranquil gaze. "This one will change the world… and I've never been more proud of my husband."

A breeze stirred up and ruffled their hair, and for a few minutes they sat in silence, lost in their own thoughts.

"About Tony," Tien said at last, and when Maria turned to look at her questioningly, Tien spoke firmly and confidently:

"You should go see him yourself, Maria. If Howard is as busy as you say, he wouldn't mind sparing you for a month or two. Go spend as much time as you can with Tony. Before-" She took in a deep breath. "Before he grows apart from you."

Maria considered that for a long moment, her blue eyes thoughtful. "Maybe I will."

* * *

**December 15, 1991**

Outside, a cold wind was shaking the bare branches of the tree in the front yard, but Mike's living room was warm and pleasant, with the Christmas tree in front of the window positively dripping with ornaments badly made by childish hands out of pipe cleaners and construction paper and glitter, interspersed with Tien's more skillfully made origami stars and poinsettias and angels.

Steve was sitting on the couch, ostensibly to read the newspaper, but really he was watching with carefully hidden amusement at the way his grandsons were crowding excitedly behind Mike as he studied the operator's manual that had come with their brand-new Macintosh Classic II — an early Christmas present for the family — which he had just finished setting up on the desk.

The monitor was ridiculously boxy, the tiny screen was black and white, the graphics were heavily pixelated, and Steve strongly suspected the whole kit and kaboodle had less computing power than the last smartphone he had owned, but Clint and Harrison clearly thought it was the coolest thing they had ever seen, and even Mike was having trouble containing a boyish enthusiasm as he hunted around for a port to plug in one of the accessories.

"Dad, give me a hand here," Mike said, throwing his hands up a little in exasperation. "Where does this thing go?" He held up something black and boxy, almost like a DVD player, except with a row of lights across the front that were all currently dim.

"What is that?" Steve asked blankly. It was too soon for DVDs, he knew that.

"Modem."

"Never used one," Steve admitted. "Now, if you had a Wi-Fi router..."

Mike laughed a little. "Fat lot of help you are."

"Why are you asking _Grandpa_?" Clint asked in confusion. "He's never even seen one of these."

That was true, even if Clint didn't yet know the reason why; after all, it wasn't Steve's fault that he had missed the entire computing revolution.

"Yeah, Grandpa still thinks math should be done on an abacus," Harrison put in, winking subtly at Steve.

"Dad, can we try the game now?" Clint said eagerly, pulling a floppy disk out of its paper sheath and leaning over Mike's shoulder to try to slide it into the drive.

"Kids, I'm trying to work on this," Mike said with a hint of impatience, blocking Clint's hand. "Doesn't Mom have Christmas presents she wants you to wrap? We'll try the game later tonight, I promise. Right now I need to get the modem hooked up. Svoboda sent me something over the NII that I need to look at. Now shoo."

"You heard Dad," Harrison told Clint. "Shoo!"

"He told you too," Clint shot back.

"He said 'kids.' That isn't me."

Clint growled in exasperation, but just then Tien called "Clint!" from upstairs, and reluctantly he tore himself away from the computer and ran upstairs.

Steve glanced up over the edge of the newspaper and saw out the window that Peggy was pulling up to the curb in their Ford Escort, just as a few snowflakes began to fall. Relieved that she had made it back before the storm hit, Steve folded the newspaper and went outside to meet her, knowing that once she came inside the grandchildren would mob her and it would be difficult to have a proper conversation.

They met on the sidewalk, and Peggy held his face between her gloved hands and gave him a quick kiss.

"Did you catch Howard at home?" he asked her.

She nodded. "Maria was out. I had a good long talk with him."

"You wanna tell me about it?"

Peggy shook her head a little. "Later. I'll tell you all about it later, but right now I want to think it over to myself." She hesitated a moment, and then added slowly: "I said what I needed to say. I kissed him on the cheek. He looked at me funny."

"Okay," Steve said, squeezing her hand. "I'm glad you got to see him. And Maria got a good long visit with Tony in France over the fall. Maybe it doesn't feel like much, but I think we did help."

"Steve, don't you think there's a chance?" she asked him abruptly. "That something we did these last few months did more than just help? That maybe we changed something that could save them?"

"Maybe."

"But you don't think so."

"We're not gods," he said gently.

Peggy let out a long sigh. "I know."

She was shivering despite her warm peacoat, and Steve led her inside into the warm house, where they found Harrison leaning over Mike's shoulder, looking at the text on the computer screen.

"Bad news from Svoboda," Mike said, glancing up as Steve and Peggy came through the door. Harrison moved aside to let the two of them see the screen.

"Howard just made arrangements for a flight to the Bahamas on his own private plane," Mike said, pointing at the monitor. "They're leaving from JFK Airport tomorrow night."

Steve sighed heavily, eyes scanning the flight information. "Well, we knew that was coming. But he and Maria aren't going to make it to the airport. Bucky's going to get to them first." The footage of the Winter Soldier's attack that Zemo had showed him flashed through his mind, and he had to suppress the surge of grief he felt anytime he thought of it. Like Peggy, he fiercely wished there was a way to undo what had already happened… but he knew in his heart that there wasn't.

"That isn't the problem," Mike said. "Well, it _is_ a problem, obviously, but the more problematic problem is _this_." He pointed at the passenger manifest. Steve saw that there were three names on it: Howard Stark, Maria Stark… and Tony Stark.

Steve stared at Tony's name for a long moment. "No," he said, heart sinking. "No. That's not right. Tony can't get in that car with them tomorrow. Tony _wasn't_ in the car with them."

"Well, right now Howard clearly intends for Tony to be in that car with them."

"But he _isn't_ going to be there," Steve insisted. "I know that for a fact."

"Yeah, but is that because Howard and Maria are going to suddenly change their minds about bringing their only child along with them for their Christmas vacation?" Mike asked pointedly. "I can't see that happening. Look here. That same plane is scheduled to bring Tony home from Heathrow the morning of December 16. They're obviously bringing him home from England just in time for him to join them in the Bahamas. Why would they bring him back to the States just to leave him home alone for the holidays? It wouldn't make any sense."

"He _has_ to be home alone when it happens," Steve said firmly. "He can't be in that car. He can't meet Bucky. He would-" He closed his eyes for a moment, feeling sick. "Hydra would kill him for the same reason they killed Maria. No witnesses."

Mike exhaled loudly. "How could Howard have been so stupid?" he burst out in sudden frustration. "Traveling with something as valuable as the serum with his _wife_ in the car, and no security whatsoever? What was he _thinking_?"

"I don't know," Steve said wearily. "I've never understood it. Maybe he thought using security would telegraph that he was transporting something valuable. Maybe he thought it would be safer to be discreet." He shook his head. "It doesn't matter. What's done is done. The point is, Tony can't be in that car. And maybe we were the ones — or _will_ be the ones — to prevent it from happening." He exchanged glances with Peggy, who nodded.

"We'll need to be delicate about it," she put in. "You said Tony never suspected there was anything suspicious about his parents' deaths. We have to keep it that way."

"I guess kidnapping's out," Harrison quipped.

"There's no need to use any heavy-handed methods to stop him from getting into that car," Mike agreed. "All we need to do is provide some kind of incentive for him to want to stay home from the trip. You know him better than anyone, Dad. Any ideas?"

"From what I was told," Steve said slowly, "there were really only three things Tony cared about in this phase of his life. Women, alcohol, and his inventions."

Mike tapped his finger on the table. "Well, in that case the choice is obvious. We get a pretty girl and we lure him away." He shrugged. "It's doable."

Steve wrinkled his nose in distaste, and caught Peggy's eye in time to see her making the exact same face. That kind of maneuver had never been Peggy's first choice during her days as an agent, although there was no denying the effectiveness of it in certain situations.

"You're talking about a poor little rich boy who's had regular access to supermodels since the day he hit puberty," Peggy pointed out to Mike dryly. "Of the people at S.H.I.E.L.D. we know we can absolutely trust — a number that is getting disturbingly smaller by the day — can you think of any of the proper gender, age and attractiveness level to compete with that?"

It was clear from Mike's falling expression that he couldn't. "We could hire an actress," he said after a few beats.

"I don't want to put Tony's life in the hands of hired help," Steve said immediately. "There's too much at stake."

A silence fell as they all tried to come up with something better.

"Could I do it?" said a voice behind them suddenly.

The four of them turned around to see Natty standing there looking at them questioningly, with her mother behind her.

"I just have to talk to him, right?" Natty asked. "Just get him to meet me somewhere the next day or something like that? So he won't get in the car with his parents?"

"No," Tien said quickly. "No, honey. We're going to get a professional to do this."

"Wait a minute," Mike said, holding up a hand. "That's actually not a bad idea. It's a pretty straightforward assignment. Mom and I could walk her through it." He looked at Peggy and Steve for backup.

"That could work," Peggy agreed. She didn't need to say what they all already knew: for most of Natty's life, a steady stream of friends and strangers had told her parents unsolicited that they ought to enter their daughter into pageants or get her into modeling or acting, advice Mike and Tien had wisely ignored in favor of keeping Natty's feet firmly on the ground. But despite the simple clothing and minimal makeup Natty favored, she was beautiful enough to turn heads on a regular basis anyway.

"She's _17_," Tien objected.

"Almost 18," Natty said quietly.

"She doesn't have to do much," Steve pointed out. "Just look pretty and pay him a little bit of attention. Tony will do the rest, believe me."

"Yeah, that's the part I don't like," Tien said flatly. "If he gets handsy with her..."

"Tony's not going to force anything," Steve said quickly. "He was never as bad as that. He just... likes pretty girls."

"Wouldn't matter if he did, anyway," Harrison said wryly. "I don't care how many private boxing lessons he's had, Natty could wipe the mat with him with one hand behind her back."

"We don't have many options, and we're running out of time," Mike said. "I think she can do this, Tien."

"I can," Natty quickly agreed.

"I don't like it," Tien said.

"Tien... there's nothing more important than keeping Tony Stark safe," Steve said quietly. "If you can't agree to it for his sake, then do it for everyone else's. There's a 50 percent chance that he'll save Natty's life one day, or maybe yours or Mike's, along with a whole lot of other people."

"I know," Tien said, sounding resigned. "And I would do it for his life alone, I really would, I just... wish there was a different way to do it." She took a deep breath. "So... how are we going to get them to meet?"

"Tony's supposed to arrive at JFK in the morning," Mike said. "We can drive her over there tomorrow and work out a way to get them to bump into each other as he disembarks."

"You do it then, he might be jet-lagged and in a rush to get home," Peggy pointed out. "And we only have one shot at this. We have to make it count. I think we need to give Natty more time to work on him. I think we need her to be on that plane with him."

"We don't have time to fly her to Heathrow to meet Tony there," Mike said, glancing at his watch. "His plane takes off in a few hours."

"We don't need to fly Natty to Heathrow," Steve said, immediately making the leap that Peggy had just made. "We have a quicker way to get her there."

Mike's face changed as he realized what Steve meant. "I completely forgot — do you think she can do it? She's still learning..."

"Only one way to find out," Steve said.

Mike grabbed his phone and dialed. "Hey, sis," he said, putting it up to his ear. "Got a favor to ask."

* * *

The next hour was a flurry of preparations as Peggy worked on Natty's hair and makeup to make her look old enough to pass for a college student, while simultaneously giving her a crash course in espionage and helping her come up with a cover story. Tien ran up to Natty's room to pack her suitcase while Mike worked on creating a dummy plane ticket and passport for her.

Meanwhile, Steve had taken Sammy and Clint over to Sarah and Dave's house to get them out from underfoot — fortunately, they were accustomed to their dad getting called away on missions, and knew better than to ask questions when they were unceremoniously sent out the door — and to bring Sarah back with him. When he opened their front door, though, and Sammy and Clint immediately headed downstairs to find their cousins, Bram was putting on his coat like Sarah was.

"I thought you had work," Steve said to Bram, surprised, as he and Sarah followed him down the sidewalk while snowflakes fluttered from the sky.

"I called in sick," Bram said as they reached the car. "Um..."

"Tell him," Sarah prompted gently.

Bram reached down into his pocket and pulled out a sling ring to show Steve, looking a little shy. "We kinda talked Master Mahika into giving me one, too. I'm not very good yet."

"We thought it was best to have more than one person in the family know how to do magic," Sarah explained as they got into the car. "If and when I ever work out the spell to activate the serum, it'll help us get the cure to patients that much quicker."

"I came so I can watch Mom while she does this," Bram added from the back seat.

"I hope I _can_ do it," Sarah said, brushing snow off the top of her head. "I've never tried making a portal over this far of a distance before."

"Does the distance matter?" Steve asked.

Sarah nodded. "The further off it is, the more dimensional energy you have to draw on. And I need a good visualization, by the way," she added. "It's pretty hard to work from pictures. It's better if it's somewhere I've been before."

"You're in luck. The Stark plane is departing from Heathrow." It was the airport they had always used to visit Peggy's parents.

"Well, that's good as far as it goes, but how am I supposed to portal Natty into the middle of a busy airport without being seen?" Sarah asked.

"Janitor's closet?" Bram suggested.

"I've never been in a janitor's closet in the airport," Sarah pointed out dryly.

"Oh, yeah."

"It's going to have to be the ladies' room," Sarah said with a sigh. "Let's see if I can remember what the stalls looked like."

By the time they got back to Mike's house, the preparations were wrapping up.

"Remember, you don't have to do _anything_ you don't want to do," Mike emphasized to Natty as he strode into the room and tucked the false ID into her purse. "In fact, it's better if you play hard to get. Tony will be more motivated to skip the Bahama trip so he can stick around with you. Here's your earpiece." He handed it to her. "Put it in as soon as the plane lands at JFK, and you can let us know how it went."

"There's a safe house on Long Island, not far from the Starks' mansion in Old Westbury," Peggy told her. "We'll be waiting there: your grandfather and I, and your parents. We're your backup in case something goes wrong."

"Your mother and I will come pick you up at JFK as soon as you land," Mike finished, just as Tien came back downstairs with the suitcase. Natty nodded, doing her best to look confident.

"You can do this," Mike told her. "You're gonna do great."

"Thank you, Daddy." She hugged him and her mother briefly in turn.

Sarah closed her eyes for a long moment, deep in thought, but then she opened her eyes and nodded. "Okay. Let's give this a try." She glanced at Natty. "Ready?"

"Ready."

Sarah slipped the sling ring onto her left hand and raised her first two fingers.

"Be patient with me," she murmured. "This takes a lot of concentration."

She closed her eyes for a moment, and then opened them again, eyes intense. She raised her right hand in a graceful gesture and began making small circles in the air. A few golden sparks snapped and scattered in mid-air. Breathing deeply and deliberately, Sarah gradually, visibly, relaxed... and finally, a small golden circle, a little wobbly and misshapen, began to take shape in the air. Bram seemed to be concentrating every bit as hard as his mother was, watching every motion she made as he fiddled with the sling ring in his hands. Carefully keeping the circle spinning in place, Sarah stepped a little closer to the opening and peered through.

"Okay," she said softly, still deep in concentration. "I think I did it." She began making wider and wider circles with her right hand, and gradually the opening widened until they could all see through into an empty bathroom stall.

"There you are," Sarah said, looking back at Natty. "Your express flight to Heathrow."

"Nice," Bram breathed softly.

"_Gross_," Natty muttered, but she took Mike's offered hand and he helped her step down into the stall as quietly as possible; they could all hear a hand dryer running on the other side of the stall door. Then Mike passed down her suitcase.

"I love you," he mouthed to Natty.

"I love you," she mouthed back, looking from her father to her mother, and then at a nod from Mike, Sarah closed the portal with a gesture and Natty disappeared from sight.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** I'd love to know what you thought of this new development, and any guesses you might have as to what happens next. Leave a review!_


	18. Chapter 18

_**Author's note:** Thanks to birdy, jerseydanielgibson, FigurativelyDying, W. Blackbird, girliemom and the Guests who left reviews! I appreciate the feedback._

* * *

**December 15, 1991**

Natty strolled out of the women's bathroom at Heathrow Airport, pulling her suitcase behind her and trying to look natural, although she felt anything but that. She had been in airports before, but always with her parents or her grandparents there to navigate, and it took her a minute of nervously scanning the area for signs before she finally managed to figure out which way to walk to get to the gate she needed. She felt awkward and self-conscious, both because she was alone and also because she was overdressed and wearing too much makeup — Aunt Peggy had done it artfully, and Natty understood that it needed to be done to Tony Stark's tastes and not her own — but it left her feeling strangely exposed.

It didn't help that the airport was bustling, with so many people streaming through the concourses that their voices drowned out the bank of TVs they were walking past, half of which were showing BBC newscasters, and half of which were broadcasting footage of President Bush adjusting his glasses at a podium as he prepared to speak at a press conference.

Still, it was kind of exciting, being here on her own, and having an important job to do. This was exactly the kind of thing her namesake would have done. Not that Natasha Romanoff had done anything like this yet. She was 7 years old this year, and her training in the Red Room had only just begun. But thinking of her made it easier to brace up, and Natty squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. She had a name to uphold, and even if this was her first mission, she was going to make it count.

Natty threaded her way between a group of Japanese tourists and a boisterous family reunion with plenty of joyful exclaiming in heavy British accents, a sound that instantly made her homesick for Great-Grandma Amanda and Great-Grandpa Harrison. But there would be no time to see them on this trip, even though they were only a car ride away. She was sorry to miss the chance.

Finally, she reached the correct gate. Natty parked her suitcase and hung back at the edges of the cheap plastic seats surrounding the gate, trying to watch for her target without _looking_ like she was watching for her target… and after 20 minutes of waiting, she spotted him.

Natty tilted her head curiously as he came toward her through the crowd. Tony Stark didn't look at all how she had been imagining him, the way Grandpa's comics had trained her to think of him. Not only did he look significantly younger — only a few years older than her, really, and completely clean-shaven, which emphasized his youth even more — but he also wasn't even dressed like a rich person. He was wearing, of all things, a white T-shirt with a Mr. Softee ice cream logo plastered across the front, with cargo pants and a pair of well-used sneakers, and nothing about him made him stand out from any of the other students rushing through the airport to get home for Christmas, unless it was the Santa hat he was wearing at an ironically rakish angle. He was walking with a purposeful gait, talking a mile a minute into a cell phone while he pulled his suitcase behind him. It looked like he was alone.

There was no time to waste. Natty reached down and unzipped her suitcase most of the way, and then took off at a fast clip, holding the flap shut with one hand. Tony was walking fast, but she could walk faster and her full suitcase didn't slow her down in the slightest. Within seconds she came up from behind and to the side of him and deliberately collided with him, letting go of her suitcase lid as she did.

Tony staggered to the side from the impact, and nearly tripped over his own suitcase. Natty's suitcase, meanwhile, hit the ground corner-first and popped open, clothes and toiletries spilling out onto the shiny floor with a clatter.

"Oh, wow, I'm sorry," Tony said distractedly, barely glancing at her as he recovered his balance. He jammed the phone awkwardly between his shoulder and his jaw, and stooped to scoop up some of the strewn items and throw them back in her suitcase lying open on the ground. "Hey, Jen?" he said into his phone. "Hang on just a sec. Hang on. I just had a spectacular collision. See, this is what I get for walking and talking at the same time."

Natty knelt down to help him repack her suitcase, forcing herself to move slowly as she was suddenly struck by a case of the jitters. What if she couldn't catch his attention? What if he completely ignored her and just went on his way? How would she explain to her family if she failed at this simple job? What if...

Tony glanced up at her, hands full of her folded socks, and then did a double-take. He knelt there on the hard floor staring at her for a long moment, even though they were both dangerously close to being trampled by people hurrying past with their own suitcases, and Natty found herself staring back just as openly. He had big, dark eyes, and she was close enough that she could smell his cologne, which was actually pretty nice, and for one bizarre moment her heart leaped in her chest and her brain seemed to short-circuit. All the various clever things she had considered saying flew right out the window, and she could only stare back at Tony, feeling foolishly like a deer in the headlights.

Tony spoke into the phone quickly, still locking eyes with Natty. "Hey, Jen? I gotta go. I'll call you back." He pushed the antenna back in, folded the phone and jammed it into his pants pocket, and then gave Natty a flash of a smile. "I'm so sorry," he said again, but this time his air of distraction had vanished as quickly as mist in the morning sunshine. "Uh... um, tôi xin lôi." He did his best, but his pronunciation was atrocious.

To Natty's relief, she managed to find her voice. "Actually, my English is better than my Vietnamese," she told him.

His eyebrows went up. "You're American?"

"Mmm-hmm. On my way home now."

Tony's eyes swept over her one more time. "Whereabouts is home?" he asked.

She had to bite her tongue to stop herself from saying _Bethesda_. "Brooklyn. I'm flying into JFK."

"JFK? Get right out of town," Tony said lightly. "That's where _I'm_ going."

"Oh!" Natty said. "Maybe we're on the same flight."

"I don't think so," Tony said. "Not unless you own the same private luxury jet that I do."

Natty laughed. "Ha, ha, very funny."

Tony's lips curled up in a mischievous smile, but he didn't press the point. "I'm Tony, by the way," he said.

She smiled at him. "Hi, Tony. I'm Candice."

A big group of tourists surged around them like water flowing around a rock, several of them giving the two of them an odd look as they went past.

"You know what, Candice? Maybe we should get out of the road," Tony said. He grabbed the last few of her items still on the floor, and Natty quickly zipped her suitcase back up and dragged it out of the way. Tony joined her, and they found an unoccupied row of chairs to sit in while Natty shoved the rest of her belongings back into her suitcase.

Tony held up her pink slippers questioningly. "Dancer?"

"Yeah."

"What kind? Modern dancer? Belly dancer? Exotic dancer?"

She took the shoes from him and tucked them back in her suitcase, more carefully than she had handled the other items. "Ballet dancer. There's an incurable streak of old-fashionedness that runs in my family."

"I don't believe you," Tony said.

She frowned. "You don't believe that we're old-fashioned?"

"No, I don't believe that you're a dancer."

She stared at him. "Excuse me?"

"You're just saying that because you know how much I love the ballet. It's some kind of conspiracy. I'll bet you couldn't even show me a… uh, a... plié?" His tone went questioning. "Plié? Is that what it's called?"

She shook her head, making a slight face at his obvious ignorance. "A plié is really easy," she informed him. "It's one of the first things a dancer learns."

"Prove it," he said, sitting back in the plastic airport chair casually. He propped one sneakered foot up on his other knee and gestured to her meaningfully. "Go on. Let's see it."

Natty pursed her lips, and then shrugged and took off her shoes, pulled her slippers back out of her suitcase and began to lace them up over her leggings. Tony watched her do it with a faint smile playing at the corners of her lips.

She stood up and turned to face him, lifting her arms gracefully into the starting pose of the routine she knew best. Then she went up onto her toes and began the opening sequence. She had no music to dance to, of course, but she didn't need it; she could hear the music in her head, and the noise of the airport faded into the background as she focused up and poured her heart and soul into the moment, as she always did.

Tony watched her dance with a broad smile slowly spreading across his face, but when she had finished the sequence and held the pose, looking at him expectantly, he affected an air of indifference.

"I've seen worse," he said.

"I think this is the part where you admit you were wrong," Natty said with uplifted eyebrow as she put her arms down.

"You make a pretty passable ballerina," Tony admitted. "You don't have to stop, by the way. I bet there's more where that came from."

"Everyone's staring," she said, and in fact there _were_ more than a few people sitting around them waiting for their flights, who were pointing and looking with smiles on their faces. Feeling a little embarrassed, she sat back down beside him and began to unlace her slippers.

"So what was that?" Tony asked. "The dying swan? The sugar plum fairy?"

Natty shook her head. "No, I choreographed that myself. It's called The Time-Traveler's Wife."

Tony suddenly laughed.

"What?" she demanded, pausing with her hands full of ribbons.

"No, the choreography is great," he quickly assured her. "It's gorgeous. _You're_ gorgeous. I want to wrap you up in tinsel and take you home to meet my mother. It's the _concept_. It's a pile of horse manure. Time travel, I mean. I've studied physics, it's impossible." He paused. "What's so funny?"

Natty shook her head merrily and tried to fight back her smile. "Wow. You sound so sure about that."

"Pretty darn."

She laughed again. "Well, you seem pretty smart, so you must be right." She slipped her shoes back on. "So you're studying physics? Here in England?"

"No, I already have my degree from MIT. Physics, yes, but mechanical and electrical engineering, too. I like the practical, hands-on stuff better. There's a professor at King's College who's working on a cutting-edge robotics project, and he invited me to fly over here to get my hands greasy. What brings you here?"

"There was a dance competition at-" Natty began, but just then a man dressed in a crisp steward's uniform approached them.

"Mr. Stark?" he said politely. "Your plane is ready for departure. Mr. Woodrow will be your pilot today. May I get your bags?"

"Not now," Tony said dismissively, not taking his eyes off Natty.

The steward paused for a moment. "Sir, your father wanted to be sure you departed by-"

"Not now," Tony said more loudly. "I'm busy. Shoo." He waved his fingers, and after a moment of hesitation the man walked away, his polished shoes clicking on the shiny floor.

Natty stared at Tony. "I thought you were _joking_ about owning a private plane."

"Yeah. Well, technically it's my dad's plane. He runs a tech conglomerate. Stark Industries. Maybe you're heard of it."

"_Stark Industries_?" Natty repeated. "Wow. That's your _dad_?"

"Yeah, my dad's a super boring topic, so I'm going to change it now," Tony said. "Let's talk about you. When does your flight leave?"

"8 o'clock."

"Sitting in first class?"

Natty laughed. "Yeah, right. My dad doesn't own a tech conglomerate."

"Who's picking you up from JFK when you get there? Your boyfriend?"

"My parents. I don't have a boyfriend."

Tony nodded thoughtfully. "Okay. Here's what we're going to do. Instead of you sitting in steerage for eight hours, crunched up in those little seats and risking damage to those beautiful ballerina legs, you're going to come on my plane instead. You'll be a lot more comfortable, and I'll even get you home a little sooner. No need to go through security."

"Me?" she asked. "On your plane?"

"Yeah. You can refund your ticket, get your money back. Use it to buy more ballerina slippers. I gotta be honest, that look kind of works for you."

Her heart beat a little faster. "I… don't know what to say. That is really nice of you to…"

"Perkins!" Tony called out, and the steward strode back over to them from where he'd been hovering nearby. "I'm bringing a guest with me. That's her bag. Be careful with it, the zipper's defective. We don't want her underwear hitting the floor. At least not here. Right, Candy?"

"It's Candice. No one calls me Candy," Natty immediately corrected him.

"Why not? You seem pretty sweet to me," he quipped with a grin.

"It's _Candice_," she emphasized, glaring at him. "And don't talk about my underwear."

"Ooo, a little spicy too. I like that."

"Shut up. And thank you for taking me on your plane."

"It's my pleasure. Or at least I hope it will be. Hey Perkins, what's the in-flight meal?"

"Dischi volanti with wild mushroom sauce, sir, or Gressingham duck with braised kohlrabi and parsnip mash. There is also a very nice lobster bisque, and several desserts to choose from."

Tony turned and walked backwards so he could grin at Natty. "I think we should start with the desserts, don't you?"

* * *

"Wow," Tony said, leaning back in his recliner and stretching out his legs luxuriously after their meal. The plane rocked from side to side slightly, but so far the flight had been pretty smooth. "Two brothers _and_ a sister? That's a big family. I can't even imagine. I'm an only child. Got the place to myself."

"It really isn't that big," Natty said. "It only feels big when my cousins are over. They're almost like siblings, too. Me and my cousin Maggie are like two peas in a pod. That's what my mom and my aunt always say."

"Don't you ever get sick of it?" Tony asked. "Having to share your stuff all the time, and the crowd and the noise? Don't you ever wish you had some peace and quiet?"

"Sometimes," Natty admitted. "But I'd rather have a fight or two with my siblings sometimes than be alone in the house all the time. Don't you ever get lonely?"

Tony shrugged. "I always have things to do."

"Having things to do isn't really the same as having someone to do them _with_. Or are you close to your parents?"

"My mom's great. She's always good company. She's…" Tony searched for the words. "She isn't selfish. Rare trait in my family. It's kinda refreshing."

"And your dad?"

"I like my dad okay." Tony shrugged again. "He doesn't really like me."

Natty frowned. "He _said_ that to you?"

"He doesn't say anything to me. Nothing that matters, anyway. I mean, look at him. He spent his life inventing things and running a company and schmoozing with the rich and famous. Starting a family was pretty much an afterthought for him. My mom and I were just the cherry on top of his sundae."

"Well…" Natty didn't know what to say to that. "But I bet he cares about you."

"Bet he doesn't. He never says he does."

Natty thought for a moment. "Your dad's on the older side, right? I've seen him on the news. He looked closer to the age of my grandpa than my dad."

"So?"

"So, I think a lot of men from that generation didn't really get affectionate with their kids," Natty said. "They weren't raised to think that way or act that way, even if they _felt_ that way."

Tony stared moodily out the window, even though there was nothing to be seen but empty sky. "Is that what your grandpa's like?"

"My grandpa's an exception to a lot of rules," Natty said. "He's always been kinda... ahead of the times."

"I thought you said your family was old-fashioned," he shot back.

Natty smiled. "Sort of. Let me put it this way: Grandpa marches to his own beat. He does whatever he thinks is right and doesn't worry about what other people think or whether he fits in with the times." She smiled softly. "It's a quality that rubbed off on the rest of us, I think."

"Wish my dad was like that," Tony muttered.

"You went into the same field your dad did," Natty pointed out. "You finished college when you were _17_. He must be really proud of you, even if he doesn't say it."

"No," Tony said flatly. "He thinks I'm a lost cause. I heard him say it himself." There was an unexpected savage undertone to his words, and suddenly all the fun had fled from both his eyes and his voice, although for hours now he had been unfailingly, exuberantly talkative. Abruptly he pushed himself up out of his slump, banged the recliner's footrest down and jabbed his finger at the call button. Perkins came back into the cabin. "Sir?"

"The Macallan 1926," Tony said. "Bring it with two glasses."

"Yes, sir."

Perkins came back in a minute later with a bottle of amber liquid, and Tony took it from him and poured some into the glasses.

"Candy?" Tony said, holding one out toward her.

"I'm not old enough," Natty said. "And it's _Candice_."

"Fortunately," Tony said, still holding the glass out, "there are no police officers on this flight."

"No, thank you," Natty said.

"Good girl, huh?" Tony set down one glass, leaned back and took a sip from the other.

"I try to be," Natty said lightly. "I know, being good is _so _uncool. But-"

"-in your family you don't care what people think. I heard." Tony swallowed the rest of his drink and picked up the other glass. "You're not going to have this? You're sure? It's a rare vintage, you know. You can't get this just anywhere. Better try it while you have the chance."

Natty shook her head, and then he shrugged and drank her glass, too.

* * *

**December 16, 1991**

By the time they landed, the bottle was mostly empty and Tony's giddy verbal torrent had finally subsided into silence. He was lying flat on his back in the recliner with a faint smile on his face, which was quickly replaced by a grimace and a low groan when the steward came back and opened the window shades, sending bright sunshine streaming into the cabin. Tony fumbled around until he found his Santa hat again, and put it on and pulled it down low so that it covered up his eyes.

"Mr. Stark? Your father's in a rush for you to get home," Perkins said. "Your Porsche is parked outside. Here we go." He reached down and tried to haul Tony to his feet, but had some difficulty. "Woodrow?" he called. The pilot came in, and the two of them got Tony up and helped him carefully down the steps as he clung to their shoulders for support, wobbling the whole way. None of them even looked in Natty's direction. As soon as they were at the bottom of the steps, Natty quickly pulled her earpiece out of her pocket and put it in.

"Dad?" she said softly.

She was relieved when he answered right away. "Hi, honey. Are you at JFK? Your mother and I are on our way to get you."

"Yes. I told Tony I'm in a performance at Radio City Music Hall tomorrow and he said he'd come and then take me to dinner afterward." She kept her voice down in case the steward or the pilot came back in. "He didn't say anything about going to the Bahamas. I don't know if that means his parents didn't tell him the plans yet, or if he just decided on his own to skip it."

"Don't worry about it. If he said he would come, then you did what you could. That's all we can ask."

"Yeah, but there's just one problem, Dad. I'm afraid he won't remember."

"Why wouldn't he remember? It's tomorrow."

Natty looked out the window, where the pilot and the steward were trying to get Tony into the backseat of a sporty red car without hitting his head, and not quite succeeding. "He's drunk, Dad. Blackout drunk. I tried to get him to stop, or at least slow down, but-" She exhaled in frustration.

"It isn't your fault, Natty," her Grandpa Steve said quickly into her ear. He must be listening in from the safe house on Long Island. "Tony always had some... tendencies toward excess. Sometimes he had a handle on it, sometimes not."

Her Grandma Peggy's voice chimed in. "His father had the same tendency. You can't stop someone from drinking if he's determined to drink."

"Okay, but what should I-" Natty broke off as Perkins jogged back up the steps and back into the cabin.

"I'll call a cab for you in just one minute, miss," he said as he collected Tony's things.

"No need, my parents are coming to get me," she said. "But I didn't get Tony's phone number. Can I just ask him real quick-"

The steward laughed in a way she didn't like, and gave her a knowing look. "He won't call you back, miss," he said matter-of-factly. "He doesn't call any of them back."

"But he said he would meet me tomorrow," Natty persisted.

"Yeah, he'll meet you tomorrow." He looked her up and down in a dismissive kind of way. "If he didn't get what he wanted from you today."

The steward left with Tony's suitcases, leaving Natty alone in the cabin again.

"Who was that?" Grandpa Peggy asked in her ear. "I know that voice."

"That was the steward. His nametag said John Perkins."

"Did he have curly red hair?"

"Yes."

"That isn't John Perkins," Grandma Peggy said with certainty, sounding suddenly intense. "That's Brian Moran. He used to work in my defense lab, under Dr. Greiling."

Natty frowned in confusion. "He's S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

"Not anymore," Grandma Peggy said. "He disappeared when Carson Mitchell did. Which means he's _Hydra_."

A jolt shot through Natty, and she leaned over to look through the window at Tony's sports car. "He's getting in the driver's seat!" she said, a sudden panic sending butterflies through her stomach.

"Don't let him go with Tony!" both her dad and grandpa said urgently in the same instant, and without hesitation Natty rushed down the stairs and across the tarmac, mind racing to come up with something to say, something to _do_ to stop this from happening.

"Wait!" she called out. "Wait!"

The steward — the Hydra agent, Moran — paused in the act of closing the driver's door as she ran up. Through the window she could see Tony lying in the back seat, curled up in fetal position with his hat still pulled down over his eyes to block out the light.

"You forgot one of his cases," Natty said breathlessly. "A big one, in the cabin."

Moran looked annoyed. "Well, why didn't you bring it down, miss? I've gotta get this show on the road. Mr. Stark's waiting."

"I couldn't lift it," Natty said. "It was really, really heavy. I think it's one of his inventions. Something his dad wanted to see."

Moran's face changed at her last sentence, and quickly he pulled the keys out of the ignition and hurried back up the steps. Natty looked after him, waiting until he had disappeared into the plane before opening the back door and diving straight for Tony's pants pockets.

"Mmmmm," Tony said in a tone of approval as she rummaged around in one.

"Shut up," she said. "I'm looking for your keys."

She found them, and slammed the back door shut and swung into the driver's seat just as Moran came to the top of the stairs, looking confused.

Moran made eye contact with her, and suddenly his eyes widened in alarm, and he scrambled down the steps. Natty jammed the key into the ignition with shaking hands, started it, and threw the Porsche into gear just before he reached the car, stomping on the gas pedal and peeling out. Moran's groping hand hit the driver's door with a thump... and slipped off as the tires finally gained traction and she roared away.

Tony groaned wordlessly in a sickly way from the back seat as Natty raced across the tarmac, her eyes frantically darting around looking for an exit. In the rearview mirror she could see Moran's dark form rapidly retreating into the distance. It looked like he was shouting into a radio.

"Natty?" she heard her dad's worried voice in her ear. "Talk to me. Where's Tony?"

Speaking very, very quietly under her breath, she whispered: "I just stole his car, with him in it."

There was a short pause. "Okay. Nice work."

Just then, she spotted an exit sign and veered toward it. She slowed down as she approached the gate, wondering if she would have to pay at the booth, or worse, show identification, but to her relief the gate opened as she approached and a man waved her through.

"Where are you now?" her dad asked.

She saw a road sign. "Aviation Drive."

"What direction are you driving?"

"I don't know. I… the radar tower is on my left."

"Okay. I know where you are. That's going to turn into JFK Expressway; just keep going. Your mother and I are 15 minutes away, coming the other direction. When we see you pass we'll flip around and follow you to Tony's house. What does the car look like?"

"It's a Porsche. Red convertible."

"Got it. How's Tony?"

She glanced back. He looked to be asleep, his mouth gaping open slightly and one arm dangling limply down toward the floor. "Out like a light."

"Good. Let's hope he stays that way."

The Porsche was now surrounded by the heavy flow of traffic exiting the airport, and Natty felt herself relax ever so slightly. Wherever Moran was, he'd have a hard time getting to her now, although she fervently wished she weren't in such a distinctive car.

"What was that all about, anyway?" she asked softly.

It was Grandpa Steve who answered. "They must have wanted to take Tony to use as leverage against his father. It's how they controlled Dr. Erskine; they put his wife in a concentration camp and then strung him along with a lot of promises and threats."

"But I thought that tonight-"

"-they're going to kill Howard. Once they have the serum it's in their best interest to make sure he doesn't survive to make more."

"They must not know where it is yet," Grandma Peggy said. "It's the only thing keeping him alive."

As she got further from the airport, the traffic began to thin out, and gradually the urban sprawl on both sides of the road was transitioning into golf courses and mansions. She had entered the more exclusive area of Long Island.

Just then, flashing lights caught her attention, and Natty glanced in her mirror to see a police car not far behind her, red and blue lights spinning. The car behind her moved into the right lane to get out of its path, and Natty quickly followed suit. The police car swooped up and merged right as well, inserting itself between the other car and Tony's Porsche, following her closely with lights still flashing.

"Dad?" Natty whispered nervously.

"What?"

"I think I'm getting pulled over."

There was a short pause. "Were you speeding?"

"No." A horrible jolt went through Natty as she realized that the Hydra agent could easily have called the police and reported that she had kidnapped Tony Stark… and he wouldn't be entirely wrong about that, either. "Dad, what do I do?"

"Don't pull over yet. What police department is it?"

"I don't know." Why did it matter? She squinted her eyes, peering through the rearview window, and then said, "It's NYPD."

"We're out of their jurisdiction," her dad said. "On this road it should be the Village PD. I'm going to turn on the scanner. Don't speed up or slow down. Just hang on."

Natty found herself clutching the steering wheel with white knuckles, shifting her gaze continually between the road in front of her and the rearview mirror where the lights continually flashed at her. The road around her was quickly clearing of cars; everyone was keeping their distance from the police car. Through her earpiece, she could hear faint radio chatter. Finally, she heard her dad's voice again.

"Honey? Nobody's talking about you on the scanner. They should be calling in your license plate or requesting backup if it were something like a suspected kidnapping, but they're not."

"What does that mean?" she asked softly.

"I think that means it isn't really a cop behind you." Suddenly his tone changed. "We just passed you, honey. Tien, flip a U-turn." Natty heard her mother say something in the background, and then her dad answered more loudly, "Yes, here. Anywhere. Just cut across the median."

In her rearview mirror, Natty saw a cloud of dust as her family's minivan jounced across the median and pulled onto the road some distance behind her.

"Hydra posed as police officers when they went after Fury," she heard Grandpa Steve say grimly in her ear, and the words were so surreal that only a few moments later Natty wasn't entirely sure he had really said them. That couldn't have anything to do with her. She had come here to get Tony Stark to ask her out on a date. A simple assignment. A straightforward one. A _safe_ one.

Suddenly the police car changed lanes again, moving to the left and speeding up to pull up alongside the Porsche.

"Daddy…" she whispered, heart pounding rapidly.

"I see. We're almost caught up to you. Just keep driving."

Natty glanced to the side, through her window, as the police car pulled even with her. There were two uniformed officers sitting in the front seat, and the one in the passenger side motioned at her sternly to pull over.

"Are you _sure_ they aren't real-" Natty started to whisper, when she caught a glimpse of a third man sitting in the shadows of the back seat, behind the partition's bars. He wasn't wearing a police uniform, but a black leather jacket with buckled straps across the front, and a muzzle-like mask over the lower half of his face. His eyes were covered with dark goggles, leaving only an untamed mop of brown hair to frame his hidden face.

Natty's heart seemed to stop. "No," she whispered. "No, no, no…"

"Natty, stay calm. We're right behind you."

"He's here," she hissed through clenched teeth. "He's here. He's _right next to me_."

"_Who's_ here?" her dad asked.

"It's Bucky," she whispered, and her voice came out as not much more than a squeak. But she was wrong, Natty immediately realized. It wasn't Bucky Barnes. It was someone much, much worse.

"It's the Winter Soldier," she whispered.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

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_**Author's note:** I would love to hear what you think! Please leave a review._


	19. Chapter 19

_**Author's note:** Thanks to sofiarose613, jerseydanielgibson, codedriver, ShannonK, birdy, FigurativelyDying, Tanya, girliemom and Guests for your reviews. That last chapter got quite the response! And thanks to everyone else who is reading, too._

* * *

**5:07 p.m., December 16, 1991**

"It's the Winter Soldier," Natty whispered over the comm, her voice thick with fear.

Steve and Peggy exchanged alarmed looks, both of them wearing earpieces that linked them up to Natty while they waited in the safe house not far from the Stark home. Mike and Tien were already in their own vehicle on the road behind her, listening in on the same channel.

"Natty, are you certain?" Peggy asked intently.

"I'm looking _right at him_," Natty said shakily. She was clearly at the edge of her control, breathing rapidly and speaking louder than she should, considering Tony Stark was right there in the car with her. For the first time, Steve felt a pulse of gratitude that Tony had gotten himself so drunk that he was blissfully unaware of the danger he was currently in. "He's in the back of the cop car!"

Steve could feel his heart begin to race. It made sense. Of course Bucky would be nearby. Within hours he was scheduled to be on a quiet road in Old Westbury only a few miles from here, lying in wait for Howard and Maria Stark. The moment Natty drove away in Tony's convertible, Brian Moran must have called him in for backup. He took a quick breath to steady his nerves.

"Natty, stay calm and listen to me," he said firmly. He understood her panic; she was only 17 and had never been in any real danger in her life, but he also knew that she was brave and clever and more than capable of rising to the occasion. "Tony was _not_ in a car accident the same day as his parents. He wasn't kidnapped or attacked. Nothing happened to him at all. That means that as long as you stay in that car with him, you're safe."

"Just keep doing what you're doing, honey," Peggy chimed in. "You're doing great."

They heard Mike's voice come in over the comm then: "Tien, speed up. Catch up to him."

"Mike, do _not_ engage Bucky," Steve said forcefully. "You're not a match for him."

"I don't have to fight him," Mike said calmly. "Just slow him down. Hydra never took Tony because we were here to stop it. Don't you think?"

Steve forced himself to modulate his voice. "Yes, I see that. But be careful. We don't know what happened to _you_."

"Move into the left lane," he heard Mike say, and Tien responded in a tense voice, "What do I do? Ram the car?"

"No. No ramming," Mike said firmly. "You're just going to tap their rear left bumper with your front right bumper. They're going to spin out and you're going to keep going down the road. Natty, as soon as we do it, hit the gas and get Tony to his house as fast as you can. Don't worry about speed limits."

Natty's voice was shaky but clear. "Okay."

"_Please_ tell me you have your gun, Mikey," Peggy said, unconsciously leaning forward as she spoke into the receiver. Steve could tell by the look on her face that she was completely unaware she had just slipped into calling their son by his old childhood nickname, something she had not done in years.

"It's in my hand," came Mike's calm reply, "but I'd rather not use it if I can help it. There are civilians around. Tien, wait until we get through this intersection."

There was a long pause. Then: "Go! Go! Do it!"

They heard Tien make a low wordless sound, and then there was a loud metallic crunch, followed by the squeal of tires.

"Help me!" Tien shouted suddenly.

"I got it! I got it!" Mike shouted. Tires squealed again. "No, don't slow down! We're under control now. Don't slow, Tien. We don't want to be in gunshot range."

"Mikey?" Peggy said tensely.

"We got 'em," Mike said briefly. "Their car spun out, it's on the side of the road. Natty, don't stop until-"

A loud bang sounded in their earpieces, making both Peggy and Steve jump. And then suddenly there was a cacophony of noise: someone crying out wordlessly, and a sustained crunch and groan and screech of metal that seemed to go on for an eternity.

Finally, it stopped. There was a long, tense silence.

"Mike?" Steve asked.

There was no reply.

"Tien?"

Silence.

"_Mikey_!" Steve said sharply. Peggy's hand was gripping his as tightly as a vice.

"They wrecked!" Natty's voice burst through the comm. She was crying. "I saw- I saw- they, they rolled down a hill. Behind me. They rolled- I can't see them anymore!"

"Did someone hit them?" Steve demanded. Beside him, Peggy seemed frozen into silence.

"No, there wasn't anyone there!" came Natty's reply. "They just started swerving for no reason, and then-"

"Keep your voice down," he reminded her automatically. "Maybe their tire was shot out." He suddenly found he was able to push through the shock and function again. Bucky had always been good at the long-distance shots.

"Do I stop?" Natty asked, managing to bring her voice back down to a shaky whisper. "I should go back and find them, right?"

"No," Steve said firmly. "It's your job to keep Tony safe. It's our job to find your parents. Just keep going. Did you see where they went off the road?"

Natty took a deep breath. "By a golf course."

"Which one?" Peggy asked, leaning forward. "There's more than one on that road."

"I don't know. I don't know!"

"Slow down," Steve said quietly. "Think back. What did you see?"

There was a brief silence. Then: "I saw… I saw a row of golf carts parked. They had blue crabs painted on the sides."

"Crab Meadow Country Club," Peggy said promptly from beside him. She picked up the phone and started dialing.

"You can't call 911," Steve said quickly.

"I know," Peggy said tersely, forestalling him. "We don't know if the real emergency services will come, or the Hydra counterfeits. I'm calling Sarah. If she can open a portal-"

"She needs a visualization."

"Maybe she can find one. There must be photographs."

It was a big "if," and they both knew it.

"Natty?" Steve said into the comm. "Keep driving. We'll get Aunt Sarah, she'll handle it. She'll find them."

"What do I do when I get to the Starks?" Natty asked.

"We're going to meet you there," Steve said, and Peggy quickly nodded her agreement as she slid her gun off the table and holstered it with one hand, phone cradled between her ear and her shoulder. He felt sick at the thought of getting into their car and driving away from Mike and Tien instead of toward them, and he knew Peggy felt the same, but it had to be this way. "We need to stay focused on protecting Tony. Bucky's not gonna stop of his own accord."

* * *

Sarah and Dave had long been in the habit of cooking up a storm on the weekends to stock the freezer with meals so that they could focus on their work during the week, and tonight it had turned out to be an even wiser decision than usual.

With eight kids in the house instead of the usual five — and most of them teens and pre-teens with big appetites — they had put not one but two pans of lasagna in the oven, and now Dave was up to his elbows in butter making a pile of garlic bread, while Sarah was busy putting an extra leaf in the table and bringing in more chairs from the garage.

The younger kids — her own Steven, Amanda and Joe, along with Mike's Sammy and Clint — were down in the family room watching "Home Alone," and from the sound of it, Kevin McAllister was just starting his mad dash toward the church to take sanctuary from the Wet Bandits.

Maggie had watched the movie with them for a while, but eventually she had slipped away and offered to help with dinner. She was even quieter than usual as she chopped the vegetables for a salad; her mind was clearly on her cousin Natty and the unplanned mission she had been sent on. Maggie had always treated Natty as more of a sister than her own sister, which made Sarah a little sad, but Amanda's personality was so much louder and more forceful than anyone else in their family that she understood why Maggie had trouble connecting with her.

Bram and Harrison, on the other hand, had disappeared upstairs; Harrison had been in a noticeably bad mood when he had arrived, and once the younger kids had gotten absorbed in the movie, it hadn't taken much coaxing for him to tell the rest of them with a scowl that his parents had once again refused to let him ride along for the mission.

"They're just picking up Natty from the airport," Bram had said reasonably. "You probably wouldn't have even gotten a glimpse of Tony."

"It isn't about seeing him," Harrison had said irritably. "It's about being backup for Dad if something goes wrong. He used to do things like this with a whole team behind him, you know? S.H.I.E.L.D.'s such a mess now, it's up to us to do it. As a family. And don't tell me I'm too young. Natty's only two years older, and they didn't even hesitate to send _her_."

Bram would calm him down, Sarah knew. He always did.

The phone rang, and Sarah sighed with exasperation, both arms burdened with chairs, but she put them down and then went over to answer it.

"Sarah?"

"Oh, hi, Mom," she replied. "Is Natty back?"

"Drop everything and put Maggie in charge of the kids. I need you this instant."

Sarah froze at her mother's tone. "Why? What's happened?"

Her mother explained succinctly.

* * *

**5:13 p.m., December 16, 1991**

Mike opened his eyes slowly.

He saw trees. Bare-branched trees that stood in dark contrast to the pale winter sky. The air was frosty, but the slanting rays of the setting sun were warming his back. That was pleasant. His cheek was pressed into the cold dirt, and his arm was twisted awkwardly underneath him, which was less pleasant.

With a grimace, Mike pushed himself up slightly and got his arm free, but even that slow movement triggered a sudden stab of pain at the crown of his head. He reached up and gingerly felt the top of his head. It was definitely tender, but there wasn't any blood when he pulled his hand away and looked at it. He squinted in confusion. What had happened? How did he get here?

He turned his head painfully and looked the other way… and froze in horror.

That was his minivan on the grass. Black smoke streaming out from under the dented hood. It was right side up, but it was smashed up on both sides, and the roof, too. Shattered windshield, with a big hole right in front of the passenger seat. Someone had been ejected from the van, and judging by the sharp pain in his skull, it had probably been him.

"Tien." Mike's lips formed the name, but not a sound came out.

His vision was a little fuzzy, but he could see her through the spiderweb of cracks in the windshield. Still in the driver's seat. She was slumped over the steering wheel, her face obscured by a curtain of dark hair.

She wasn't moving.

A jolt of alarm shot through him, and he started to push himself up on his hands and knees, but his eye was drawn by movement: a pair of black boots walking toward him at a leisurely pace. For a second, he felt an intense relief. Someone had seen the accident. Someone was coming to help.

Then he remembered why they had crashed in the first place. His eyes slid up, and widened at what he saw. Black pants. Black jacket. Black mask. Black goggles.

The Winter Soldier.

Mike had almost managed to scramble to his feet when the Soldier reached him, grabbed him, and hurled him bodily through the air. All his breath left him in a rush as his back struck the trunk of a tree, and then he hit the ground hard, mouth opening in a silent grunt of pain.

The Soldier didn't even bother checking him. Just turned around and strode toward the minivan casually. He was heading for the driver's side. For Tien.

A wild desperation surged through Mike's veins, and without hesitation he pushed through the pain and the shock and staggered to his feet. The Soldier was almost to the door. All it would take was a single blow. No time to catch up to him, and Mike found that his holster was empty; his gun was nowhere to be seen. His eyes darted around and spotted one of his vehicle's tires lying on the ground nearby.

He grabbed it, whirled around, and heaved.

The tire struck the Soldier squarely in the back, and he sprawled to the ground, but instantly turned the fall into a roll, rising smoothly to his feet and then turning slowly to look in Mike's direction. His eyes were invisible behind those dark goggles, but Mike thought he almost detected a sense of surprise in his body language.

"Leave her alone," Mike growled through clenched teeth.

There was no reply, at least not a verbal one. The Soldier simply turned his back on the smoking remains of the minivan and started to walk back toward Mike. It was what he wanted, but it was also _not_ what he wanted, either. Putting his fists up in guard position, Mike's mind raced back over everything his dad had ever told him about the Winter Soldier. Maybe it wasn't hopeless. Dad had been able to hold his own against the Soldier, and Mike had learned how to fight from him.

But he knew his own limits. He wasn't as strong as his dad. And unlike Dad, the Winter Soldier had no memories of Mike, buried or otherwise, to dredge up in an effort to snap him out of his implacably murderous mindset.

"Mike? Is that you?"

Mike froze. That was Dad's voice in his ear. His earpiece was still functioning. He had completely forgotten it was there.

"Dad?" he said with a hint of sheepishness. "You know that thing you told me not to do?"

"Mike…" Dad said with a warning tone.

"I'm about to do it." He took a deep breath and let it out. "For Tien."

* * *

Sarah hung up the phone and turned toward Maggie. She and Dave were both looking at her curiously, but they'd only heard her side of the conversation.

"Maggie, go get the younger kids," Sarah said tersely. "Tell them to get their shoes and coats on, get them loaded into the van."

"Where am I taking them?" she asked with a frown, knife still hovering over the cutting board, tomatoes forgotten.

"Anywhere. I don't care. Take them to see the lights. Take them for ice cream. You can take my purse. Just don't let them know anything's wrong."

"Why, what _is_ wrong?" she asked, blue eyes wide.

"Quickly, please!" Sarah leaned over and turned off the oven as Maggie whirled to obey. "Dave, get the boys from upstairs. I need the three of you to dig up a photograph for me. It's an emergency."

Dave knew better than to ask questions, he just took the stairs two at a time, calling: "Bram! Harrison!"

Sarah could hear Maggie shutting off the movie and directing the kids to get their shoes on, explaining that an important business call was expected at any moment and they needed to leave the house for a while so her mom and dad could hear themselves think, and she did it so calmly and confidently that the kids were actually complying with a minimum of fuss.

The older boys came downstairs with Dave, and after Sarah gave them a few hastily whispered words of instruction, Harrison ran to dial up the modem to see if Crab Meadows Country Club had a website, while Bram rushed up to his room, explaining breathlessly that he'd gotten a brochure from a bio sciences college on Long Island, and maybe they would have included photographs of nearby attractions to entice students to enroll. Meanwhile, Sarah was frantically flipping through a stack of magazines, hoping and praying that somewhere there would be an ad for the golf course in question and already fearing that there wouldn't be. But what else could she do? The sling ring was heavy in her pocket; by car Mike and Tien were hours away, but she could be there in moments if she only had a visualization. Mom and Dad had to focus on keeping Tony safe — the safety of the planet, the _universe_, depended on it — and that meant that if she couldn't rescue her brother and sister-in-law now, maybe no one could. Her heart was a drumbeat in her chest.

"Mom?"

She glanced up distractedly from the magazine she was rifling through with sweaty fingers. Maggie was ushering Amanda, Joe, Sammy and Clint into the garage where the van was parked, Amanda and Clint arguing loudly about where they should go for ice cream, but Steven was standing there with his winter coat in one hand and a string of well-worn rosary beads dangling from the other. He looked at Sarah silently, and there was a wealth of questions in his eyes.

"Steven!" Maggie said from the doorway, her tone sharpening for the first time. "Mom's busy!"

Sarah's eyes flicked down to the rosary beads and back up to Steven's face. He nodded almost imperceptibly and turned to go, glancing back one last time as Maggie put her arm around his shoulders, fairly pulling him into the garage and then slamming the door shut.

"They don't have a website!" Harrison called out from the office just then, but Sarah wasn't particularly surprised by that; the internet was still so young, plenty of businesses hadn't seen the use of it yet.

"No good here, either," Bram said in disappointed tones, jogging down the stairs with the college brochure crumpled in his fist.

Sarah exhaled noisily, trying not to despair. "Help me go through these-" she started, when Dave walked back into the room and silently held a photograph in front of her face.

It was the Crab Meadow Country Club.

"Where did you get this?" she gasped, snatching it from him and immediately setting herself to memorizing the details.

"There's a job opening at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory I was invited to apply for," Dave said. "They have discounted memberships at the golf course for their employees."

Confusion managed to pierce through her desperation to get to Mike and Tien. "_What_?"

"I'd just about talked myself out of it," he said calmly. "It's more money, but I knew you wouldn't want to uproot the whole family and move to New York."

Sarah quickly waved her hand in his direction; he was right, but she couldn't think about that now. She grabbed her sling ring and ran outside, holding the photograph up to study and then realizing she'd need both hands to conjure. But Bram was already at her elbow, taking the photograph and holding it up for her. Dave and Harrison hovered in the background, watching.

Sarah took a deep breath and slid the sling ring onto her fingers, fixing her gaze on the photograph. "Here goes."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

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_**Author's note:** Leave a review and let me know what you think! _


	20. Chapter 20

_**Author's note:** Thanks to Spanish girl, jerseydanielgibson, Nimrodel 101, alive by grace, codedriver, FigurativelyDying, birdy, sofiarose613, girliemom, Tanya and Guests for your reviews! I'm excited to say that with this post, I've now hit 100,000 words, more than 100 reviews, and more than 400 views each day I post a new chapter. I really appreciate the interest!_

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**5:21 p.m., December 16, 1991**

Natty was afraid the guard at the entrance onto the Stark estate would give her trouble, but he obviously recognized Tony's sports car as she pulled up to the gate, and when he leaned out of the booth window and looked into the back seat to see Tony lying there in a stupor, he sighed deeply and said only: "His father's going to hit the roof."

"I know," Natty said in a small voice.

With a shrug, the guard opened the gate and waved her through. Trying to still the trembling that kept sweeping over her, Natty drove up the winding road that led to the mansion at the top of the hill. For the first time since this mission had begun, she felt alone, truly alone. Her earpiece had gone silent.

"You need to concentrate on taking care of Tony," Grandma had said softly in her ear. "I'm going to turn off your audio now. You can open the channel back up if you need to talk to us, and I'll get back on to let you know the moment we know something about your parents. Aunt Sarah's looking for them now. Understand?"

"I understand."

"Don't worry. Your grandfather and I will be there in just a few minutes. We'll park on the road, out of sight of the security station, and keep watch from there."

"Okay."

And then all had gone quiet.

But turning off the sound couldn't turn off Natty's worries, couldn't make her forget that the last she'd seen of her parents, their family minivan had been rolling off the road and down a hill, with the world's deadliest assassin just out of sight around a bend in the road. He was presumably still fixated on going after either Natty's parents, or Tony and herself.

She couldn't relax. Not yet.

Natty pulled up to a stop on the gravel loop right by the front door, and quickly she swung out into the frosty air and opened the back door, reaching in to pull Tony into an upright position.

He wasn't exactly unconscious, but he was pretty out of it. In fact, he was as limp as a wet noodle, and it took quite a bit of maneuvering to get him out of the back seat and onto his wobbling feet, where he draped one arm across her narrow shoulders and leaned on her heavily. He still smelled like whiskey. Nervously Natty glanced over her shoulder. No other car coming up the lane, at least not yet.

She wrapped an arm around Tony's waist and pulled him forward into a stumbling walk. He was taller than her, and yet she wasn't supporting him so much as she was half-carrying him. Apparently he wasn't so hung over that he didn't notice that simple fact.

"Wow, Candy. You are really strong," he mumbled as he staggered along by her side, squinting in the bright rays of the setting sun.

"I'm a ballerina, remember?" she said quietly. "We work out."

She heard the front door unlatch just before they reached it, and she was relieved when it opened automatically with the faint whine of machinery. It must have some way of sensing Tony's presence. Carefully she helped Tony up a couple of steps and over the threshold.

In the foyer, everything was spacious and clean and decorated just so, with a huge Christmas tree that sparkled red and gold nestled in the curve of the staircase, but Natty barely registered that. She just looked around for the nearest place to put Tony, and saw a pair of French doors that opened up into a music room dominated by a beautifully polished baby grand piano. There was a couch behind it, under the floor-to-ceiling windows. Without hesitation she guided him around the piano and plonked him heavily onto the couch. Tony immediately laid down and curled up into a fetal position once more, tugging the Santa hat back over his eyes and hugging his arms across the Mr. Softee logo on his chest.

"'s cold," he mumbled, and she looked around until she spotted a festive red velvety blanket draped artfully over a wing chair. She pulled it off and tucked it around Tony, trying to be gentle, but he grimaced and made a wounded sound.

"You okay?" she asked hesitantly, feeling ridiculously out of her depth. She didn't know how to take care of someone who had drank too much. In fact, she'd never actually _seen_ a drunk person up close before, not unless you counted the movies. What exactly was she supposed to do for him? What if he threw up and choked on his vomit? She hadn't heard any sounds in the house yet, and for all she knew they were alone here.

"Head hurts," he mumbled.

"I can… I can try to find some Tylenol?"

Tony made a whining noise in the back of his throat that sounded like an assent, so she got up and went to the threshold of the music room and looked around. She had no idea of the house's layout, and the hallways were practically as wide as rooms, making everything look imposing, but she tried walking down one and lucked out; it did in fact lead to a bathroom. She looked in the cupboard and behind the mirror, but there was no medication to be seen. It was just a guest bathroom and wasn't stocked with anything but toilet paper. She went further down the hall and found herself in a spacious kitchen. She tried a few cupboards, but she only saw dishes. Just then she spotted a woman's purse on the counter.

Feeling oddly guilty, she looked around to make sure she was alone and then opened it up and carefully looked through. Yes, there was a little bottle of Tylenol. She shook out a dose and then poured a glass of water from the sink.

When she turned off the water, she heard footsteps. They sounded like they were coming down the stairs. Cautiously, she tiptoed down the hallway and carefully peered into the foyer just as gentle piano chords sounded, and a woman's voice softly sang:

"Try to remember the kind of September…"

Through the open glass doors of the music room Natty could see a woman sitting at the piano, wearing a powder blue blazer and a pearl necklace. She had blond hair pulled back into a bun. Tony's mother, no doubt. As she played the piano she glanced over at Tony lying on the couch, and a fond smile touched her lips. Natty shrank back behind a potted tree, still clutching the glass of water in one hand and the pills in the other, unsure of what to do next.

"-when grass was green…" Maria Stark sang, and just then a white-haired man man strode through the foyer and into the music room: Howard Stark. Glancing up at him, Maria stopped singing, but kept gently playing the chords.

"Wake up, dear," she said over her shoulder to Tony, "and say hello to your father."

* * *

The Winter Soldier took a swing at Mike, his metal arm flashing in the setting sun.

He had the sense not to try to block it, and instead ducked smoothly, dealing out a kidney punch on his way back up. He hit as hard as he could, but it didn't have quite the effect he was used to seeing. The Soldier fell back only a few steps and then, recovering quickly, backhanded him casually. Mike went sprawling, feeling a hot gush of blood pour down his face.

"Mikey, _don't fight him._" His dad's firm voice came through his earpiece.

"I don't have a _choice_!" Mike shot back, the metallic taste of blood in his mouth. He staggered back to his feet and immediately launched himself at his opponent, using a flying kick that used the full weight of his body. He struck the Winter Soldier in the chest and he fell back, but recovered quickly and then whirled around in a vicious attack of his own that Mike was hard-pressed to defend himself from. The two of them fell into a flurry of strike and counterstrike that went too quickly to permit thought, leaving him to rely on instinct alone. For a period of time that seemed to stretch beyond its natural limits, there was only blurred motion, and impact, and pain.

The impasse didn't last long. Suddenly Mike caught sight of a metallic flash, and the next thing he knew a knife was slicing through the air toward his face. Bending backward to avoid it, he could not recover his balance fast enough to avoid the boot that struck him in the side only a second later.

He _felt_ the crunch more than he heard it, and a fresh bolt of pain jolted through him. It took him a little longer to get back on his feet this time, and he could not suppress a guttural groan as he involuntarily clutched at his ribs. Something was broken. A lot of somethings. The Winter Soldier faced him in an alert crouch, muscles taut, knife still held at the ready. His face was invisible behind his mask.

"You can't reach him with blows," his dad said urgently in his ear. "Fight him with words! Say this word! Zhelaniye!"

The Soldier attacked again, whip fast, and Mike fended off a fresh flurry of blows, doing everything he could to keep the knife as far away from him as possible. But he was getting pushed back, and the agony in his side was making him clumsy. The Soldier was controlling the fight, and that was bad news. But Tien was helpless in the car, and he couldn't leave her undefended, whether he was outmatched or not. "What?!"

"Repeat after me!" his dad shouted. "Zhelaniye!"

"Zhelaniye!" Mike repeated. The Soldier hesitated for a millisecond, mid-swing, and Mike took the opening, jabbing with his left fist and cracking one of the lenses of his goggles.

"Prorzhavevshiy!" his dad said.

"Prorzhavevshiy!"

"Semnadtsat!"

"Semnadtsat!"

Mike understood now what they were doing, and he repeated the sequence of words with a will, using the best Russian accent he could muster. Meanwhile, he was getting the jelly beat out of him. Sweat was stinging his eyes, and everything hurt, and every word he shouted seemed to spur the Winter Soldier into a greater desperation. No longer was he striking with the implacable strength of a man who was only programmed to do so. Now he was fighting like a wounded animal that had been driven into a corner, and his breaths were as loud and ragged as Mike's, even though he had not gotten nearly as good as he had given for the entire fight.

"Odin!" Mike said hoarsely, and he threw up an arm to protect his face, but the next blow knocked him flat on his back anyway.

"Gruzovoy vagon!" his dad said in his ear.

"Gruz-" The Soldier stomped on his stomach, and he gasped for breath. "Gruz- Gruz-"

"Gruzovoy vagon!" his dad repeated in his ear.

Mike forced the words out with a terrible effort. "Gruzovoy vagon," he wheezed.

The Soldier froze, his knife clenched in his fist right above Mike's chest, where it had been about to come down.

Then slowly and deliberately, he lowered his knife hand. He reached up and pulled off his goggles. Unlatched his mask. Dropped it on the ground.

Mike looked up at him in astonishment… and a sudden pulse of pity. His face, familiar to Mike since childhood, was exactly as he remembered it. Exactly as Dad had drawn it. Right down to the blank expression in his dark eyes, and the way he jutted his jaw out ever so slightly, giving him a sullen kind of look that stood in marked contrast to his open, smiling gaze from his earlier years.

If Mike hadn't hated Hydra already, he was really starting to hate them now.

"Bucky?" he asked, tense with hope.

Bucky didn't respond in any way, verbal or otherwise, but stood there looking at him with a kind of weary expectation.

Mike felt his heart sink in disappointment. "Soldat?" he tried next.

Bucky blinked at Mike unsmilingly and said in a low voice, "Gotov soblyudat."

"He's ready to comply," his dad said in his ear, and the relief in his voice was evident.

Mike sat up stiffly, trying not to twist his torso as he pushed himself up but unable to prevent a fresh stab of pain in his ribs as he slowly got back on his feet. Bucky made no move, either to prevent him or to help him. Wobbling a little on his feet, Mike snuffled loudly and then wiped his nose with his sleeve, leaving a thick smear of blood.

"Don't-" he said, and then paused to take in a couple of shallow, pained breaths. Even his _lungs_ hurt. "Don't hurt her." His eyes slid over to Tien, still slumped over the steering wheel. "Don't hurt her."

Silence was his only response. Bucky's eyes weren't a window, they were a blank wall. But he wasn't fighting anymore, and that was all Mike needed. "You were ordered... to go after... Tony Stark," he continued, panting despite his best efforts. "Don't take him… don't hurt him… don't touch him."

"Da ser," Bucky said. His tone was cool and business-like. It clearly didn't matter to him in the slightest whether he completed his original mission or not. All he wanted to do was comply. It was all he _could_ want. It was all they allowed him to want. Mike had to suppress a sudden fury that rose up in his gorge. He'd known the violations Hydra had inflicted on Bucky, but somehow he hadn't really _felt_ it until this moment: The wrongness of it. They'd taken away his freedom to choose. To think for himself. He was nothing more than a mindless puppet. A fate worse than death.

"Or the... the girl he's with," Mike added.

A faint nod.

"Good man." Mike coughed a little, wincing as his ribs were jarred by the motion. "You're a… a good man."

Bucky went very still. A hint of a crease showed between his eyes. A faint confusion.

Just then an engine roared nearby, and they both turned to see a man on a motorcycle turning off the road and careening down the grassy hill toward them.

He wasn't wearing a helmet, and instantly Mike recognized Brian Moran: The Hydra agent who had once worked in Dr. Greiling's lab at S.H.I.E.L.D., the one who had posed as a steward on the Starks' private plane. Bucky's handler, at least for this mission. The man who had apparently been put in charge of the operation to steal the serum and kill Howard Stark.

"Grab me… by the shirt," Mike gasped, and instantly Bucky obeyed, clutching his collar firmly with his metal hand. Mike grabbed onto his wrist with both hands in an effort to look like he was resisting, although in reality it was much easier to stay on his feet now, with Bucky supporting him.

"Don't tell him… what I told you," Mike whispered urgently. "And Bucky?" He sucked in a painful breath. "Soldat?"

Bucky looked at him questioningly.

"Don't hurt... Howard Stark."

"Mike. You can't-" his dad said softly in his ear.

Mike set his jaw, not taking his eyes off Bucky. "Don't hurt... Howard and Maria Stark. Promise me."

There was another faint nod, another low acknowledgement: "Da ser."

Moran pulled up to a stop near them and swung off the motorcycle. Mike opened his mouth one more time, ready to give Bucky one last instruction — "Kill him" — but he realized an instant later, with sinking heart, that here was one order he could not give.

Asking Bucky to spare the lives of the innocent people he'd been brainwashed into attacking was one thing. That was a mercy, not only to his intended victims, but also to Bucky himself. Ordering him to commit another killing was something else. If Mike ordered Bucky to kill, even a Hydra agent, he would be taking away Bucky's right to choose just as surely as his Hydra handlers had. And Bucky would have more than enough blood on his hands to torment him when he finally came back to himself. Mike could not add to that burden. He would not.

"Let go of him," Moran said as he approached them, his gait unhurried and his expression casual. Instantly Bucky obeyed, and deprived of his support, Mike fell heavily onto his knees.

"Go to the rendezvous point and wait for instructions," Moran said. His eyes raked over Mike, kneeling bloodied on the ground, and then took in the smashed minivan behind him. "I'll clean up here."

Bucky never said a word, merely climbed onto the motorcycle and roared off. His goggles and mask were left discarded on the grass, but Moran either didn't notice or didn't care that his prized soldier's anonymity was now gone.

Moran strode toward Mike with a cocky kind of swagger in his step; he was armed and utterly unafraid of this man before him who had already been subdued. Mike knew he needed to get back on his feet, knew he needed to put Moran in his place once and for all. Tien needed help, and he was the only one who could give it to her.

But his head pounded with pain with every beat of his heart; he had never taken a beating like the one Bucky had just given him, and he knew without a doubt that there were bones broken, that he was bleeding inside. If he could only catch his breath... maybe he would be able to gather the strength he needed to give Moran everything he deserved. To get Tien to safety. Mike took in one ragged breath after another, trying to get air, trying to gather that strength.

Moran grabbed Mike by the collar with both fists. "You're a dead man," he said, low. Matter-of fact. "But I'm gonna let you have your last words."

Mike grunted as a fresh jolt of pain shot through him, and he tried to grab onto Moran's wrists to pry them away, but everything was going fuzzy and he couldn't quite manage it.

"Who the hell are you?" Moran demanded loudly. "Does Stark have security we don't know about?" He shook Mike roughly. "Answer me!"

Mike smiled tolerantly through bloodied lips, and said nothing. He seemed to be looking at Moran through a tunnel of gray, and the tunnel was growing narrower by the moment. He furrowed his brow fiercely and forced himself to concentrate. He had to hang on. Had to be ready to fight back. In just a minute...

Moran flew into a cold fury. "You better start talking, soldier, or you'll wish you had!" he hissed through clenched teeth. "No one knows how to inflict pain better than I do. I can do it fast or I can do it slow. Now. Why don't you start by telling me your name?"

Mike coughed a little and then croaked out one word: "Hercules."

Moran squinted at him in disbelief. "Hercules?" he repeated suspiciously. "What is that, a code name?"

"No, dope," Mike said contemptuously, and he paused for a moment to spit out blood. It hurt to talk, but he forced out the words hoarsely. "Demigod. Son of Zeus."

Moran stared at him.

"You know... the guy who... killed the Hydra?" Mike helpfully clarified between ragged breaths.

Moran's eyes widened, and then darkened. He raised a fist furiously, and Mike waited for a blow that never came.

"Hey!"

Still clutching Mike by the collar, Moran turned toward the new voice, and he could not have been more surprised than Mike himself was to see a 15-year-old Harrison, of all people, inexplicably standing there with his fists up in guard position, fixing Moran with a furious stare.

"Leave my dad alone!" he growled, and then his fist came flying directly at Moran's head.

Moran didn't get even a moment to react. One moment he was holding Mike with a vice-like grip, and the next he was hitting the ground like a sack of potatoes.

Harrison actually looked startled, looking down at Moran's limp body, and no wonder: he'd never hit anyone for real before, not with his full strength. Mike saw with aching eyes that there was a spinning halo of gold behind his son, with Sarah standing in the center of it, sling ring in one hand and the other circling in the air; her backyard was clearly visible through the portal.

Mike let himself sag with relief. He hadn't dared to hope for backup, but he had never been so happy to see his family in all his life.

"Dad, are you okay?" Harrison asked anxiously, stooping to help him up. Mike painfully staggered to his feet, leaning on Harrison more than he wanted to. "Where's mom?"

Mike turned to look at the minivan, and Harrison followed his gaze. She was still slumped over the steering wheel. Still motionless.

"Mom!" Harrison cried out, a spike of fear in his voice, but the next moment they heard the wail of a siren approaching, and they turned to see two police cars pulling to a stop on the shoulder of the road, and uniformed men spilling out the doors.

They could have been police officers, or they could have been Hydra. There was no way to know, and Sarah didn't wait around to find out. She flung her arms outward and the portal opened wider, and then she shoved her hands forward, eyes intense.

The portal slid forward and swallowed up Harrison and Mike and Moran and the entire minivan. With a quick gesture Sarah brought her hands together, and the portal snapped shut.

They were in the safety of her backyard.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** Feedback is welcome! Please leave a review._


	21. Chapter 21

_**Author's note:** Thanks to Sarah Duncan, MagicLia16, LilyAnneBlack, Nimrodel 101, sofiarose613, birdy, FigurativelyDying, jerseydanielgibson, girliemom, SpanishGirl and Guests for your reviews! They are really encouraging._

* * *

**5:42 p.m., December 16, 1991**

Howard Stark pulled the blanket off Tony's head without ceremony. "Who's the homeless person on the couch?" he asked.

Tony staggered to his feet, and from her vantage point in the hallway, looking through the potted tree fronds, Natty could see him valiantly trying to look sober, even though he was visibly wincing as he turned to face his father.

Howard inhaled deeply through his nose. "Whew. You even _smell_ like a homeless person. Whiskey? That wouldn't be my Macallan 1926, would it?"

"You put it on my plane," Tony said, sounding hoarse. He cleared his throat roughly, and then cleared it again. "I assume it wasn't for decoration."

"_My_ plane. And my whiskey." Howard scrutinized him for a long moment, and then said, "Pack your bags. Time to go."

"Pack?" Tony repeated confusedly, rubbing his temples with eyes squeezed shut for a moment. "I haven't even _un_packed. Mom told me to come home for Christmas."

"Change of plans," Howard said.

"Your father's flying us to the Bahamas for a little getaway," Maria put in, still playing a gentle melody on the piano.

"Hop to it, we need to leave within the hour," Howard said.

Tony didn't move, beyond putting one hand down on the arm of the couch in a not-so-subtle effort to steady himself.

"Well, don't thank me all at once," Howard said after a long pause.

"Be nice, dear, he's been studying abroad," Maria said.

"Really, which broad?" Howard asked, reaching over and pulling off Tony's Santa hat. "What's her name?"

"Candice," Tony said, and Natty automatically shrank back further behind the tree, hoping against hope that she wouldn't get dragged into the conversation somehow. "And I can't go to the Bahamas, Dad," he added. "I have _plans_."

"For what, a toga party here at the house? They have girls in the Bahamas, you know," Howard said. "And probably well-aged whiskey, too. Everything you could ever need." His sarcasm was evident.

Tony stared at his dad for a long moment, drawing himself up and squaring his shoulders. "Let me guess. You just need to make a quick stop at the Pentagon first. Right?"

Howard frowned. "The Pentagon?"

"Yeah, the Pentagon. You know, that five-sided building full of G-men who breathlessly await your latest contribution to humanity?" The longer Tony talked, the less mushy his words were; he was concentrating fiercely. It almost sounded like he was delivering a pre-planned speech. "Or were you planning to pretend you're just popping in to enjoy the holiday menu at the commissary?"

Howard looked blank. "What are you talking about?"

"Your super-soldier serum. Don't you need to deliver it before you leave town?"

Maria stopped playing the piano, and looked over at Tony in surprise.

"The serum? How did you-" Howard broke off, and turned to face Maria. "Did you tell him?" he asked, bewildered.

"Of course not," she said quickly.

Howard's confusion gave way to a sudden suspicion. "What, have you been _spying_ on me?" he demanded of Tony.

"I'm not a spy, Dad, I'm just a second-rate version of you who doesn't care about anything but women and whiskey."

"Where did you hear about the serum?" Howard demanded.

"Well, I'll tell you, Dad. I heard about the serum because I was doing what you _wanted_!" Tony shot back, his tone defiant although he was suddenly trembling, his eyes glistening. "You hated my MIRV missile idea, remember? Fine! I decided to try something different. To make _you_ happy! So I built _this_."

He reached down into his pocket and pulled out something so tiny that it could only be seen as a round silver glint between his thumb and forefinger.

"A listening device. Smallest ever built. I put one here in the music room and set up some relays. I wanted to see how far I could shuttle the signal without losing integrity. But I turned it on from my workshop here in the house to test it first, and let me tell you-" His tone was savage now. "-when you let in Wendy Moira Angela Darling or whoever that Brit was and told her all about your disappointing son, I could hear _everything, c_lear as a bell."

Maria's mouth dropped open. "_Howard_-" she started, looking at him with a horrified expression.

"Don't you dare take his side!" Howard snapped, pointing his finger at her in warning. He looked back at Tony, face reddening with anger. "You had no right to listen in on my private conversations."

"I put it in here so I could hear mom's _music_!" Tony objected, flinging his arms out in a vehement gesture. "How was I supposed to know you were going to have a top-secret meeting in here in the middle of a fundraiser?" He took a deep breath, controlling himself with an effort. "So... you're making a new super-soldier, huh? I guess that makes sense, since you lost the last one at the bottom of an ocean."

Howard had gone abruptly cold. "Don't talk about things you don't understand."

"Both of you, _stop_ it," Maria said, her voice rising. "Howard, let Tony-"

"Well, I wish you the best, Dad, because I, for one, am really hoping you succeed." Tony's voice was thick with sarcasm. "So go ahead, go make yourself another _Captain America_." He fairly spat the words out. "Maybe you can adopt him, and then you'll finally have a son you can be proud of."

Howard had swallowed back his rage. "You know, they say sarcasm is a metric for potential," he said coldly. "If that's true, you'll be a great man some day. Now get your bags. It's time to go."

"_You_ go. Go to the Bahamas, or go to hell. I'm staying here with Candice."

Howard shook his head. "Do what you want," he said, clipping off the words abruptly. "I guess you will anyway." He glanced at Maria, whose makeup was steadily getting ruined by the tears streaming down her face. "I'll get the bags."

He strode out of the room and, to Natty's relief, went straight up the stairs without taking a glance in her direction, his face set and his mustache as stiff as a brush.

Tony walked over to the music room's entrance and crossed his arms, leaning up against the door frame and trying to look nonchalant, but the hurt was all too plain to be seen on his face. His mother followed him, looking concerned.

"I'm so sorry," she said, almost in a whisper.

"Not your fault," he said shortly. "Never yours."

Maria opened her mouth to speak, hesitated for a moment, and then said carefully: "He does miss you when you're not here."

Tony stared at the Christmas tree in the foyer with unseeing eyes. "Yeah. Sure."

"Come with us," she said, reaching up to stroke his arm gently. "It's Christmas, Tony. You can't stay here alone. Let's just… let's just be a family for the next few days. The two of you don't have to talk about…" She sighed deeply. "You don't have to talk about _anything_ with him if you don't want to. Just… come have Christmas with me. Please."

"Wish I could, Mom. But we wouldn't make it a pleasant holiday for you. And you deserve one." He shook his head slightly. "It's better this way. I should really…" He swallowed. "I should just get a place of my own. You could come and see me whenever you wanted."

She shook her head quickly. "Don't do that, Tony. Don't. I'll talk to him. I'll make sure… I'll make sure you can feel at home here. This _is_ your home." She rubbed his arm. "You can always come home."

His only answer was a clenched jaw, and slowly her shoulders sagged.

"I'll get him to cut the trip short," she said at last, her voice a little choked. "I'll make sure we're back by Christmas Eve. All right?"

Tony nodded slightly. Blinking back tears, his mother leaned forward, resting one slender hand on his chest, and kissed his cheek tenderly.

Then she stroked his cheek with one hand and tried to smile a little before turning to leave, her heels clicking on the tile floor until the front door closed behind her.

* * *

The portal in the backyard snapped shut, and without hesitation Sarah shoved the sling ring in her pocket and darted toward the minivan, grabbing the dented driver's door and tearing it off its hinges. She unceremoniously tossed the door on the lawn and reached in, gently brushing Tien's hair back from her face to check her pulse.

There was a heartbeat. But it was faint. Sarah quickly checked for broken bones in the spine and, not finding any, carefully scooped Tien up in her arms, pulled her out of the minivan and laid her down on the grass. Immediately Dave was by her side, ready to assist.

Neither one of them were an ER doctor, but it wasn't hard to determine the problem: the front of Tien's shirt was soaked in blood, and there was a large glass shard lodged in her chest. Sarah and Dave exchanged horrified looks, and then glanced over at the others.

Harrison had carefully lowered Mike to the ground and Bram was checking him over now; he was no ER doctor either, but he knew basic emergency care, and even though Mike looked battered and bruised, he was breathing and alert and Sarah could tell at a glance that Tien was the priority right now.

"Harrison, run inside and call 911," Dave said breathlessly.

After one shocked look at his mother lying unconscious on the grass, Harrison raced to obey.

Working together, Sarah and Dave peeled back the torn shirt to get a better look at the injury. Blood was seeping out in rhythmic pulses, which meant the heart itself was damaged. Probably perforated by the glass. Pulling the shard out was out of the question; it would only make the bleeding worse. But Tien had clearly already lost a lot of blood, and in the time it would take for the ambulance to arrive, and even more time to get her to the hospital and into an operating room...

Sarah and Dave exchanged glances, both understanding the grim truth: Tien was not likely to last that long.

Through the open back door, they could hear Harrison talking urgently to the 911 operator. Sarah looked back down at Tien, mind racing, knowing there was no time for mistakes or hesitations, and came to a simple decision.

"Your serum," she said, looking up at Dave. "The cardiovascular variant-"

"-isn't tested yet," Dave said tersely. "And neither is your magical technique. We can't-"

"-we can't possibly make this worse," Sarah interrupted firmly. "We may not have tested it yet, but we know how the serum works. If she desires to be healed, she will be. It's as simple as that."

Dave's distress was evident in his eyes, and he hesitated for a long moment, obviously realizing she was right, but not particularly wanting her to be, and she knew why. As a geneticist, he had long ago learned that a slow, deliberate, thorough process was the key to getting reliable results. Spur-of-the-moment decisions were not in his purview.

"Honey, by the time the ambulance gets here-" she said, keeping her voice low so that Mike and Bram wouldn't hear.

"Okay," Dave said suddenly. "Okay. We'll try." He ran over to the shed that housed their laboratory equipment and punched in the code. He barged inside and came back out seconds later with a blue vial clutched in his hand. He knelt by Tien's side and loaded the serum into a syringe, his hands surprisingly steady.

He put his thumb on the plunger, and then hesitated. "But if she's unconscious-"

"Only her body is unconscious; her astral form is fully aware," Sarah pointed out. "Dad blacked out in the chamber before his transformation was complete, and it worked just fine."

Dave nodded, then took a deep breath and injected the serum.

Sarah was already gearing up to do her part, getting her hands into position, breathing deeply and slowly, imposing a calm on herself. There was no time for doubts, no time to indulge her own emotions. There was only the energy flowing through her body, and the long-practiced motions she had developed for coaxing it to flow outward. Within seconds she felt the power seeping from every pore in her skin, but kept her eyes closed to maintain focus. Moving her hands slowly and deliberately, she felt the power drain from her own body bit by bit, but she carefully reserved just enough to maintain her own life functions.

When she began to feel woozy from energy loss, she knew it was time. Opening her eyes, she flung her arms outward in one sharp, precise motion, feeling the power crystalize into two tight beams intersecting her chest, firmly anchored in the anahata field Master Mahika had taught her about. The glowing energy curved back behind her body in twin loops for a long breathless moment, and then she _snapped_ that energy forward, compacting it into her cupped hands held down by her belly.

She looked down at the trembling azure ball of energy she had gathered and, taking a long slow breath, she pushed it deliberately inside Tien's body.

Instantly she felt a wave of weakness wash over her, and dimly she was aware that she was falling backward, that Dave was supporting her own limp body, but all of that seemed vague and unimportant: first and foremost in her consciousness was a hyper-awareness of _Tien_, a powerful shift in perspective that left her centered in someone else's being, rather than her own. Tien's sense of self, her deepest desires, her chi, was now mingling with Sarah's own.

To blend two astral forms into a single physical space was a serious matter. Sarah knew that. She'd expected disorientation. She'd expected turmoil, a clash of opposing wills, maybe even a sense of violation.

But she felt none of that. Instead she felt, of all things, a serene _familiarity,_ and with some astonishment Sarah realized that contrary to what she had naively assumed, this was _not_ the first time that her astral form had mingled with someone else's.

It felt like...

Like her very earliest memory, running into her parents' room in the middle of the night frightened by a bad dream, and feeling her father's strong arms wrap around her, and her mother's lips press against her hair.

It felt like crying with her friend Jenny the day she'd found out her little brother had leukemia.

It felt like being in church while the organ played and sunlight slanted in through the stained-glass windows, with the wafer melting in her mouth.

It felt like holding hands with Dave as they recited their vows at the altar, and it felt like their babies moving in her womb. It felt like a thousand good-night kisses to her children, and the bittersweetness of watching them grow and change.

In fact, it felt identical in every respect to _love_.

She'd even felt this with Tien herself before. Tien, her sister in marriage when she hadn't had a sister by blood. They had helped each other raise their children. Comforted each other through the stresses of adult life, especially their mutual worry over Mike and the dangers of his profession. Their spirits had already brushed up against each other, no magic required.

_We're not made to be separate,_ Sarah realized with sudden certainty._ None of us. We're made to unite._

Experimentally, she tried moving her awareness around a little, sensing that Dave's serum had done its job. Tien's genetic structures had been loosened, and her body was prepared for a transformation. The only question now was what that transformation was to be. It would be Tien's decision. She was only here to provide guidance and strength.

But Sarah didn't have to go searching far and wide to find Tien's wishes; Tien knew her body was damaged. Her desires were fixed on caring for her family at all costs... which meant her will to live was very, very strong.

She wanted to be whole again.

They _both_ wanted it.

Sarah opened her eyes, and without hesitation or fear, she reached forward and yanked out the glass shard.

A blinding blue light flared, and then everything went dark.

* * *

**6:04 p.m., December 16, 1991**

Natty waited until she heard Howard roll the suitcases outside and shut the door behind him before emerging from her hiding spot behind the potted tree and returning to the music room.

Tony was still standing in the doorway, arms folded protectively across his chest, his face set and his dark eyes unfathomable. She approached him and silently offered the Tylenol and the glass of water she had been clutching this whole time.

"Oh," Tony said, coming out of his reverie reluctantly. "Yeah. Thanks." He popped the pills into his mouth and knocked back the water, wincing as he swallowed it all down.

"I guess you heard all that," Tony said then, a little glumly, setting the glass down on the curio cabinet and leaning against the door frame again.

"I'm sorry," she said simply. What else _could_ she say? Grandpa had always believed that the wildness of Tony's grief over his parents had had an edge of guilt to it. And now she knew why. It hadn't been the kind of conversation most people would choose to have if it was the last time they were going to speak to their loved ones.

And then a horrible feeling washed over her. A selfish one. What if she had just had the last conversation she would ever have with _her_ parents? It had all been so rushed and confused. Not the way she would have chosen, either.

The fear threatened to choke her. When she had volunteered for this mission she had assumed it would be a chance to serve Tony, to pay him back in some small way for the things he would one day do for her and her loved ones. To protect him, maybe even comfort him a little on what was about to become the worst day of his life.

She had known his parents would be in danger. She had never dreamed her own parents would be in danger. That maybe this would be the worst day of _her_ life, too.

A glance out the music room's window showed her that Grandma and Grandpa's car was parked far down on the road outside the Stark property. It was mostly hidden behind a thick evergreen bush in the gathering gloom, but her eyes were sharper than most and she could see the faint gleam of metal even from this distance. It was undeniably comforting to know they were so close, but it wasn't enough. It was her father and her mother she wanted. She had taken it for granted that they would always be there for her. Her family was everything to her. Her whole world. Safe and secure.

Now she was afraid, but this time it wasn't fear of the Winter Soldier.

It was fear of the _future_.

"The future can't come fast enough," Tony said with sudden vehemence.

It hit so close to what she'd just been thinking that Natty stared at him, startled out of her dark thoughts. "What?"

"Ever think about that?" Tony continued. "Can't be worse than now, right? So it's gotta be better. Wish I could hurry it along somehow." His handsome face was pulled into a frown of concentration. As if he were already trying to come up with ways to make it happen.

He was so wrong that it wasn't even funny... or at least, Natty started to think that, until suddenly it was as if she saw the pages of Grandpa's comic books flipping backward through the years, issue by issue, leaving behind the bleak battlefield covered in fluttering ashes and the somber faces of the Avengers gathered around a burned-out suit of armor... and instead moving on to a lake house, where a dark-haired little girl with her arms wrapped around her dad's neck was planting an enthusiastic kiss on his cheek. And then there were more scenes flashing before her eyes: Tony willingly leaving his beloved workshop to follow a red-headed woman with a teasing smile downstairs to bed. Tony shelling out vast amounts of his hard-earned money without a second thought to equip the Avengers and build them a headquarters and fund their missions. Tony being the life of the party, too busy trading clever quips with Rhodey and Bruce to even think about drinking hard, his manners so easy and charming that even Steve Rogers couldn't help but smile to see it, even if he tried to play it cool...

And then, struck by some impulse she didn't fully understand, Natty found herself flinging her arms around Tony's neck and clinging to him like he was a life preserver. He felt solid and real and safe, and to her shock she found that she needed reassurance every bit as much as _he_ did.

"Wow," Tony said with a slight chuckle, putting his arms around her in return. "How come you didn't do _that_ on the plane?"

"There's more good than bad," she whispered, her voice thick with emotion as she pressed her cheek urgently against his, the better to feel the warmth radiating from his skin, knowing he wouldn't understand her words but not caring. "A _lot_ more. I swear to you-"

"What?" he murmured in her ear, puzzled. "More good in _what_?"

"In the future." She shook her head slightly. "Or the past. Most people think they're different places, but my family knows better. There's a bridge between them." She took a quick breath, feeling intensely comforted by his tight grip around her waist. "But it'll be worth it, Tony. Every second of the pain. I _promise_."

Tony pulled back a little and looked into her eyes.

"I'm too hung over to understand one single word you're saying," he admitted. "But darned if you aren't as cute as a button while you're saying it." He reached out to gently smooth back a strand of her hair and gave her the same kind of look she'd gotten from Jason Schaffer when he'd taken her home after the Homecoming dance, only with none of the awkward teenage nervousness behind it.

Tony Stark really was every bit as single-minded as Grandpa had said. But for some reason, Natty no longer found that vaguely annoying. It was part of who he was, and in a way it was actually kind of endearing.

"Shut up," she told him.

And then he kissed her.

* * *

Steve and Peggy sat in their car, waiting together for any sign of Hydra agents nearing the Stark property. He held Peggy's gloved hand tightly in his own, feeling her silent shivers despite the thickness of her winter coat: they'd turned off the car to avoid detection, and now that the sun was nearly down, it was growing steadily colder.

A few minutes ago, they had watched Howard come out of the house with two suitcases and a golf bag, walk down the cobblestone path and disappear into the large, detached garage on their property.

Steve had had a handful of such glimpses of Howard over the years; always from a distance, always careful to remain out of sight, never giving in to the temptation to speak to him. He'd had to rely on Peggy to give him news of Howard, and let her speak words on his behalf when they were worried about Howard and felt that he needed their advice. He'd been Howard's friend for all these years, in every way that he could be... but Howard had never known it, and Steve could not deny that it had hurt to stay aloof like that.

And yet, despite years of restraint, tonight he felt his heart hammering in his chest, fingers itching to open the car door and race up the hill, aching to talk to Howard himself, to shake his hand one last time, to tell Howard he had missed him, that he was proud of him, that one day Tony would make them _both_ proud.

But he couldn't be selfish. He'd seen the time stamp on the CCTV footage of the car crash: 7:01 p.m. Howard had less than an hour of life left, and Steve couldn't throw that precious time into disarray by coming back from the dead just to say hello.

And yet...

The things he had heard through his earpiece a short time ago were making his head swim with questions. Questions that had no answers.

Mike had told Bucky not to kill the Starks... and Bucky had agreed to his new orders without hesitation.

Steve never could have guessed such a development. And even though he understood how all this worked, had lived his life by the Ancient One's rules since the day he came back home to Peggy, he suddenly found himself wondering: Was it possible that they _had_ actually changed the future? That Howard and Maria's lives would somehow be spared after all?

To his own surprise, Steve found himself accepting the possibility. Daring to hope for it. Embracing it.

Saving the lives of Howard and Maria was unquestionably good. And if they had changed this one thing, other changes would follow. Maybe other good things.

Maybe Tony would straighten himself out sooner. Reconcile with his father, waste less of his life in wild living. Become a nobler Iron Man. One who was better suited to work peaceably with the Avengers when the time came. More ready to commit to Pepper Potts, and more capable of meeting her needs. If they had started a family sooner, if Tony had lived long enough to raise Morgan to adulthood...

Or maybe he would never become Iron Man at all. Without the guilt that had so often driven him, what would he be left with? With his parents alive, would he ever have taken that fateful trip to Afghanistan where the Ten Rings had captured him, and his desperate circumstances had spurred him into new creative heights and made him rethink his involvement in the weapons business? Could Pepper have fallen in love with the unrepentant playboy version of Tony Stark? Could she have succeeded in changing someone like that into a family man?

And if not — if there was no Iron Man, no reformed Tony Stark — what would happen when the Chitauri attacked New York and a nuclear bomb was launched at Manhattan? Could any of the rest of them have stopped it? And even if they could, what would happen when Thanos himself came for the Infinity Stones?

Maybe they would still be able to stop him.

It was a very big maybe.

Steve was no Sorcerer Supreme. He had no tool to show him any alternate future, terrible or otherwise. With certainty gone, he was as blind as any other being in the universe now, seeing only the past and the present. It was a terrifying thought, and Steve knew in a flash that he had become too complacent, that he had come to rely on his foreknowledge too much.

_I have to live like there's no tomorrow,_ he realized. _Whatever we've done today, whether we changed something or not, it's already done. All we can do is our best, and face the consequences of our choices, good or bad. Just like everyone else._

Slowly, as if moving in a dream, Steve put his hand on the handle and opened the car door.

"Steve?" Peggy asked suddenly from the driver's seat. "What are you doing?"

"I'm gonna go see him," Steve said.

She frowned. "See who?"

"Howard," Steve said.

"_What_?" Peggy looked alarmed. "Steve-"

"While I still can." He squeezed her hand and then let go to swing out of the car. He stood on the gravelly road and leaned in for a moment. Peggy was looking up at him open-mouthed. "You stay here," he told her. "Watch for Bucky." He glanced down at the gun lying between the seats. He knew there was no point in telling her not to engage: she'd do whatever she felt was right, no more and no less. If they hadn't changed the future, Peggy would be safe tonight. If they had...

If they had, then all bets were off.

"I love you," he told Peggy.

"I love you back," she said automatically, a faint hint of a dimple flashing in her cheek despite the worry in her eyes.

He shut the door, and disappeared into the night.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** Let me know what you think! Feedback is always helpful._


	22. Chapter 22

_**Author's note:** Thanks to MagicLia 16, Spanish girl, girliemom, Figuratively Dying, birdy, sofiarose613, Says-the-Slytherin, Nimrodel 101, jerseydanielgibson, hi, Guiltypleasure82, and Guests for your reviews! Thanks for your patience, this chapter wasn't quite ready to post last week._

* * *

**6:14 p.m., December 16, 1991**

When Sarah opened her eyes, she was looking at the ceiling.

Bram's worried face floated over her, and she realized he was carrying her up the stairs of their own home. She felt as weak as a baby in his arms. It was an unfamiliar feeling for her, one that was deeply unpleasant.

Bram eased her carefully through a door frame, and a few moments later laid her gently on her own bed.

Her hand brushed up against someone else's hand, and she turned to look. Tien was lying next to her on the bed, the bloody tatters of her shirt still pulled apart to show...

The gash in her chest. It was gone.

Tien's eyes were closed, and her hand felt cool to the touch — too cool — but she was breathing steadily. Dave was standing by the bedside, wrapping a blood pressure cuff around her arm.

"Is she...?" Sarah asked weakly.

"The injury's completely healed," Dave said promptly, in a cool and matter-of-fact way. "Pulse is normal. But it doesn't change the fact that she lost a lot of blood." He was pulling things out of his medical bag; the supplies from the lab that they used to draw blood from Dad for their research. "She could use a transfusion, and I'm the same type." He rolled up his sleeve and expertly strapped a blood pressure cuff onto his own arm. "Bram, you'll have to do this part." He held out a pair of medical gloves and a bottle of iodine, and Bram hurried over to perform the blood draw.

"Mike?" Sarah asked hoarsely.

"The ambulance we called took him to the hospital," Dave said, as Bram swabbed his vein. "They suspected a punctured lung. He was stable, though; I think he'll be okay. Harrison went with him."

She frowned. "But how did-?"

"-we explain the wrecked minivan parked in the middle of our backyard?" Dave finished. He looked over at their son expectantly, but Bram only shook his head a little as he inserted the needle into his dad's arm with a slight frown of concentration.

"He's too modest to say," Dave said. "He managed to make a portal. Moved the van to the street in front of our house, and Mike too. We told the responders it was a hit-and-run. I don't think they suspected anything." He studied Sarah closely. "You okay, honey?"

"Tired," Sarah said softly. Even giving birth hadn't wrung her out this thoroughly. She laced her fingers through Tien's, and closed her eyes wearily. "Just tired."

But almost immediately her eyes popped open again as she remembered something worrisome.

"That guy," she said urgently. "That guy Mike was fighting. He came through the portal with us. Where-?"

Dave and Bram exchanged uncomfortable glances.

"Well..." Dave said slowly. "He was unconscious. Harrison was keeping an eye on him while we were dealing with Tien. At some point the guy must have woken up, but Harrison didn't notice right away. He was pretty distraught by what was happening. Can't blame him for that."

"He got away?" Sarah asked in horror.

"No," Dave said quickly. "No, he didn't get away. Harrison chased him down and took him down again. But as soon as the guy saw that he couldn't escape us... well, we think he must have taken some kind of poison. He's dead. Nothing we could do. Harrison was pretty upset."

"I moved him into the lab," Bram said soberly, his voice quiet. "We'll have to... deal with that, I guess. Later."

Sarah laid her head back down on the pillow, forcing herself to relax, to rest, so that she could get back to her old self as quickly as possible. Her heart went out toward her other children, to Steven and Amanda and Joe. And to Mike and Tien's Sammy and Clint, who had been left in her care. They were all with Maggie still, and she was sure they were fine — Maggie had always been so steady with the younger ones — but the need to see them herself, to put her arms around them all, was almost overwhelming. She was used to worrying about her mother and her brother when they were out on a mission, but everything tonight had hit so close to home.

She had no regrets at all. Mike and Tien were going to be okay. They had slowed down the Winter Soldier enough that Natty could get Tony Stark to safety. That was what was most important.

And there was one other thing: the serum had _worked_.

A flush of joy warmed her to the very tips of her toes. _The serum worked._ All the time and effort she and Dave had spent over all these years — the sacrifices made by the whole family to make it possible — had paid off. They had the power now to heal all kinds of injuries and maladies. Limited only by the time it would take to extract new serum from Dad's blood. That was still a hitch to overcome, but tonight they had taken an enormous step forward. Suddenly anything seemed possible.

And the thing that had troubled her since she was a girl — since the first day she discovered she was not like other people — was fading away, leaving a rosy glow of hope in its place. No longer did she hold a blessing that the rest of humanity was denied.

Now they could share it with anyone.

* * *

Natty opened her eyes slowly as Tony pulled away, her lips still tingling from his kiss. There didn't seem to be room for thought in her head, and she had no idea if taking things this direction had been a good idea or not, but for some reason it didn't seem to matter right now. She was sick with worry over her parents and she didn't want to feel alone right now... and neither did he. For now, it was enough.

Which was why she didn't pull away when he started to lean toward her again.

Just then, a voice came in through her earpiece. "Natty? It's me. It's Harrison."

She pulled back slightly, eyes locked on Tony only inches away from her. Could he hear that? She really hoped he couldn't hear that.

"I know you might not be able to talk right now," her brother said softly in her ear, "but I wanted you to know that I'm with Dad. He's a little banged up, but he's gonna be okay. Mom is at Aunt Sarah's house. She's resting. She's okay, too. We thought you should know."

The relief she felt was so intense that she felt dizzy, and it took every particle of control she had not to respond to Harrison. But he seemed to understand that, and after a short wait — in which she heard the unmistakable sound of a hospital heart monitor beeping with reassuring regularity — there was a soft click in her ear, and silence.

Natty's heart pounded wildly in her chest, a drumbeat of life and hope and jubilation. Mom and Dad were _alive_. They were safe. They were going to be there for her. She wasn't alone. Her world was still intact.

And knowing that simple fact, she did the only thing she could do, which was let loose a single, audible sob as tears sprang to her eyes. Horrified, she tried to choke it in, but it was too late: Tony was staring at her aghast.

"Wow. That isn't the, uh, the usual, uh... response," he said, shifting his weight from one foot to the other uncomfortably.

"Sorry," Natty gasped, hurriedly smearing a tear away and regretting it the moment she saw the black smudge of eye makeup all over the back of her hand. "Sorry, I'm just… I just… sorry. I'm sorry." She took in a deep, shaky breath and tried to regain some control.

"Was it that bad?" Tony asked, with a slight self-deprecating laugh. "Or was… Oh wow, that wasn't your first time, was it? Was it too much? Did I just scar you for life?"

"No!" she said quickly. "No! No to all of that. It was fine." His brow creased, and she quickly added: "It was better than fine. Really. I'm sorry, I'm just…" She exhaled noisily. "I'm really jet-lagged, Tony. I'm kind of a mess right now."

"Oh." He seemed to relax. "Okay. Well, you wanna chill out for a while? We have the place to ourselves. We can do whatever we want."

"Yeah," she said softly. "Whatever we want." She met his eyes meaningfully. "I didn't hear your dad's car leave yet," she pointed out.

"So?" Tony said blankly.

"There's still time," she said. "You could go out there. You could catch him before he goes."

Tony laughed shortly. "What for?"

She fixed her eyes on his intently. "To say something. Say what you _really_ want to say to him-"

"I'm pretty sure I just did," he interrupted, a scowl creasing his brow.

"-because if you don't..." She took a deep breath. "You'll regret it."

"I'm a Stark. Regret is my middle name," he said dismissively. "I've got a better idea." He caught up her hand and pulled her toward the curved staircase. "Come on. Let's go upstairs."

"Upstairs?" She pulled her hand back, resisting. "What for?"

He laughed a little. "Why do you think? I mean, I feel lousy, you feel lousy... Let's go make each other feel better." When she didn't answer right away, a confused look crossed his face. "Isn't that why you came?"

"Tony, I… I care for you in ways that… I can't even begin to explain," she said confusedly. "But it isn't like that. It doesn't always have to be about _that_."

Tony gave her a look of utter mystification. "I don't know what else it could be about."

"Someday you will," she said softly.

* * *

Steve Rogers stepped into the detached garage on the Stark property and carefully closed the door behind him, conscious of the cavernous space inside that would amplify even the smallest of sounds; the structure was really more like an airplane hangar than a garage, large enough to house Howard's large collection of cars both classic and modern, as well as some projects he was tinkering with that were too big to be built in the workshops in the house.

It was warm in here, compared to the chilly night air outside, and Steve rubbed his hands together as he slowly scanned the cars in the garage until he spotted the one that was occupied: a brand-new Jaguar XJ6, undoubtedly an expensive luxury car that nevertheless looked hopelessly boxy and dated to Steve's eyes, accustomed to the sleek futuristic cars Tony had favored.

Howard was sitting in the driver's seat, head down, reading something that was propped up on the steering wheel.

Without hesitation, Steve coolly walked to the passenger door, opened it, and sat down. He looked over at Howard, who was concentrating fiercely on a magazine — a trade journal of some kind — and didn't bother to look up even when Steve shut the passenger door behind him. No doubt he was expecting his wife to be the one to join him in the car.

It was strange to see his old friend close-up at last. So different from the first time he'd ever seen Howard: on stage at the Stark Expo, looking dapper in his tuxedo with his glossy-black hair and devil-may-care smile, surrounded by beautiful women and the hovering car that for some reason never had ended up on the market. Now his hair was snow-white, his face lined with creases around his mouth, his expression serious as he concentrated on the words in front of him. His wedding ring gleamed faintly in the garage lights overhead.

"Did you get the passports?" Howard asked, not looking up from his magazine.

"No, I can't say that I did," Steve said.

Howard jerked his head up, took one wild-eyed look at Steve, and lurched away from him so dramatically that he jammed himself up against the driver's door, his seatbelt stretching and straining with the motion, one hand darting inside his suit jacket instinctively.

"What in the-?" he started, and then he abruptly fell silent, staring at Steve with wide eyes, his hand frozen in place over his heart.

Steve waited patiently, watching Howard's expression run the gamut from fear to suspicion, to faint recognition and then full recognition, lingering a good 30 seconds on utter disbelief, and finally settling on pure, unmitigated astonishment.

"You've got to be _kidding_ me," Howard said at last.

"Hello, Howard," Steve said calmly. "It's been a long time."

Howard's shoulders were heaving as he fought to get his breath back. "Am I cracking up?" he muttered to himself in an incredulous tone.

"It kinda looks like it," Steve agreed. "Take a deep breath, Howard. I don't wanna be responsible for you having a heart attack."

"There's nothing wrong with my heart," Howard said a bit shortly, pulling his hand out from inside his jacket and dangling the hand-held laser he'd been clutching in front of Steve's face, face tight with irritation. "You're lucky I didn't put a hole through your chest." His scowl deepened. "Or worse, punch you in the face."

Steve made a slightly wounded expression. "I thought you'd be glad to see me."

"_Glad_?" Howard huffed out, shoving the laser back into his suit pocket. "I just spend the last-" he broke off for a moment, hands waving as he searching for the number.

"45 years," Steve supplied readily.

"-45 years believing you were dead! I trawled the Arctic for you, I threw money at ship's captains like it grew on trees, I made an _idiot_ of myself over you! I... I _drank_, Steve!" His dark eyes were accusing.

"I know," Steve said seriously. "Peggy mourned for me, too. And all the Commandos. You think I wanted that? Nothin' I could do about it. I was stuck where I was. Believe me, I missed all of you as much as you missed me."

Howard scrubbed his face with both hands, releasing a sigh that was more like a growl. Suddenly his shoulders shook as he laughed shortly.

"Steve Rogers is alive," he said to no one in particular. "Sure, why not? Steve Rogers, back from the dead and hanging around in my garage. Makes perfect sense."

"It barely makes sense at all," Steve said. "The world is even stranger than you know. But yes... I'm here."

Howard looked him up and down, his amazement gradually turning to curiosity.

"You got old," he said at last.

Steve couldn't help but let a smile tug at the corner of his mouth. "So did you, pal."

"Well, yeah, but I'm just some guy. I sometimes wondered if the serum would have stopped you from aging. You know, if you hadn't _died_." Howard put a twist of sarcasm on the last word.

"Slowed it. Didn't stop it. But that's okay," Steve said matter-of-factly. "I never wanted to live forever."

Howard looked at him for a long moment, processing everything. "Does Peggy know?" he asked at last.

"Peggy knows." Steve shot a teasing look at Howard. "And here you thought there was no Mr. Carter."

Howard raised his eyebrows so high they practically disappeared into his receding hairline. "So... what? You faked your own death just so you could come running back to Peggy and play_ house_ with her?" Howard shook his head and chuckled dryly. "You always did like her better than the rest of us."

"I didn't fake anything," Steve automatically corrected. "I _was_ dead, or as good as, for a long time. Technically, I still am. By the time I made it back home, after the war was over-" He shrugged. "Didn't see much point in correcting the record."

"What do you mean, you still are?" Howard asked with a frown.

The click of high heels drew their attention, and they both looked over to see Maria approaching, looking at Steve through the car window with some confusion. Howard quickly unbuckled himself and opened the driver's door, standing up with his foot resting on the running board, and looked at his wife over the roof of the car.

"Hi, honey," he said.

"Howard? Who is this?" Maria asked in confusion.

"Oh, nobody special, just some old guy from Brooklyn I used to know," Howard said. "Did you get the passports?"

"No, I thought _you_ got them," she said, glancing at Steve again.

"Better go get them," Howard said. "They're in the safe. We need to leave in 30 minutes, hon, or we're going to miss our plane."

Maria gave Steve one last puzzled look before turning to leave the garage again.

Howard climbed back into the car and shut the door. Steve looked at him more seriously. "I've missed you, Howard."

Howard shook his head. "Why didn't you tell me the second you got back?" he asked. "I know you think I never shut up, but if you didn't want me to tell anyone, I wouldn't have told anyone."

"It wasn't a matter of trust," Steve reassured him. "There were… complications. I would have liked to see you, too."

"That wasn't really you, was it?" Howard suddenly asked, turning to face him more fully. "With the Tesseract?" His brows knit together. "Have you been Peggy's secret weapon all this time?"

"I'm retired, Howard," Steve said. "That was my son. Our son. Mine and Peggy's."

"Your _son_…" Howard looked at him in wonderment. "Well, well, well. Steve Rogers finally got himself a taste of fondue. How was it?"

Steve kept his face and voice carefully deadpan. "I never knew cheese and bread could taste so good."

Howard laughed, and then he laughed, and then they were both laughing like idiots, sitting there in a Jaguar with the cold winter wind blowing outside, and it felt so bizarrely normal that Steve knew in a flash that he had been right to come.

"Why now?" Howard asked then. "I mean, you've been pretending to be dead all this time. Why are you here now, sitting in my car?"

Steve's smile faded. "To tell you the truth, Howard, I'm a little worried about what's in your trunk right now."

Howard looked at him blankly. "You're worried about my golf clubs?"

"No, the other thing in your trunk," Steve said patiently.

Howard looked at him even more confused. "You're worried about a suitcase full of Hawaiian shirts and Bermuda shorts?"

"The _other_ other thing, Howard," Steve said with some exasperation. "The super-soldier serum."

Now it was Howard's turn to look exasperated. "First you, now Tony," he said with a sudden flare of irritation. "Why does everyone think I'm taking that stuff to the Pentagon tonight? I'm still negotiating with the Department of Defense over the price. I wasn't born yesterday. I'm not transferring the goods until I have the check in my hand."

"You don't have a case with five IV bags full of super-soldier serum in your trunk?" Steve asked, a challenge in his voice.

"_No_," Howard said vehemently.

Steve was quiet for a long moment. Was it possible Howard was actually telling the truth?

"Show me," he said.

They got out of the car. Howard opened the trunk and gestured inside with a flourish.

Steve made quick work assessing the contents. Two suitcases, the aforementioned golf clubs, and a spare tire. Nothing else.

"_What_?" he murmured to himself, standing stock-still in utter confusion.

"I don't know where you and Peggy get your information, but it's obviously unreliable," Howard said dryly. "And I didn't make five doses, by the way. I made six."

"Six?" Steve repeated, brow creasing. But there had definitely been just five Winter Soldiers besides Bucky. Suddenly he found himself questioning _everything_. Had they somehow changed the future, not tonight, but even sooner than that? Something that had changed the number of doses Howard had made? And changed the date when he intended to hand over the completed product?

There was too much that he didn't know. Much too much. He needed answers.

"Howard, how did you make your serum?" he asked abruptly. "Without my blood to extract it from?"

"I assume you want the Cliff's Notes," Howard said, "unless you managed to get a degree in biochemistry while you were busy being dead." He was being sarcastic, of course, but Steve quickly shook his head, eager for the explanation to continue.

"Well first, I figured out how to make the original formula from scratch," Howard said.

Steve felt a surge of jubilation; even Dave and Sarah had not been able to do that after all these years, relying instead on an endless supply of blood samples from him. "And how did you solve the stability problem?" he pressed on eagerly.

"It isn't impossible, it's just unbelievably expensive and time-consuming," Howard said. "Basically, you map out the entire DNA sequence of your candidates and identify all the gene combinations you want to alter. You've heard of the Human Genome Project?" Steve nodded. "That's what I did, only I picked out _six_ human subjects, so you can imagine that step alone took quite a while... although I pioneered some techniques to speed things along. Then you tool each dose of serum to match each individual's genetic profile, and make adjustments for their unique physiology: blood type, PH levels, hormones, every fiddly little thing. Pretty touchy work. Enough to give even _me_ a headache."

"Dr. Erskine didn't do it that way," Steve said.

"Oh, believe me, I know," Howard said with feeling. "He found some kind of shortcut, faster and cheaper, but damned if I could figure out what it was. But there's more than one way to skin a cat. I got there my own way. You think hard enough and throw enough handfuls of cash around, you can solve just about anything."

Except he _hadn't_, Steve knew. The Winter Soldiers had been wild, impossible to control even with Hydra's heavy-handed training tactics. Howard's stability fix had been a failure. Unless...

"You keyed each dose to a specific individual?" Steve said slowly. "What would happen if it was given to someone else instead?"

"I don't know," Howard said, shoving a fist into a pocket. "I wouldn't like to find out. Psychosis, probably. We did some animal testing first, and that was the general result until I got the formula perfected."

Steve passed a hand slowly over his face, amazed. So Howard's formula hadn't been flawed after all. It had just been administered by a bunch of clumsy Hydra thieves who hadn't had any clue what they were messing with. And suddenly he realized: between the three of them, Sarah, Dave and Howard had solved the mystery of Erskine's process from beginning to end. Howard had successfully duplicated the original serum formula. And Sarah and Dave had discovered the magical process for enacting the change in a quick, reliable way, no handfuls of cash or touchy, time-consuming lab work required.

Hindsight was 20/20. The three of them should have been working together all this time.

"I was real careful, Steve," Howard said, his tone unexpectedly serious. "Choosing the candidates. I picked them out myself. I looked for men who reminded me of _you_, to tell you the truth. I, uh... I wanted to make Peggy proud of me for a change."

"She _is_ proud of you," Steve said firmly. "We both are. And I think maybe we owe you an apology, Howard. We underestimated you, and we should have known better. You've done good work here. On the serum, and on Tony too."

"Tony?" Howard snorted. "Don't make me laugh."

"Howard, look at me," Steve said seriously. When Howard met his eye, Steve put his hand on his shoulder and spoke slowly for emphasis:

"Tony's gonna figure out what's really important. He's gonna straighten himself out. He'll become a good man."

Howard laughed humorlessly. "You can't know that."

"I _do_ know that," Steve said with certainty. "Howard, you know I never lie. Trust me: one day Tony is going to save far more lives than I ever did."

Howard stared at him, clearly torn between wanting to hope for such a future, and fearing to. "I'd give anything to make that true," he said gruffly.

"We both would," a voice said, and they both turned to see that Maria Stark standing there with the passports in her hand, looking at them both strangely.

"Howard, who is this?" she asked slowly.

Howard cleared his throat slightly. "Honey? This is Steve Rogers."

"Steve... Rogers...?" she repeated in disbelief, staring at him openly.

"Where are you getting your information?" Howard demanded of Steve. "How could you possibly know all this?"

Steve took a deep breath. Oh, well. In for a penny, in for a pound.

"Remember when I told you, just a minute ago, that I was still as good as dead?" he said.

Howard waited expectantly.

"Howard," Steve said gently, "I'm still lying in the wreckage of the Valkyrie. In the Arctic, buried under the ice and snow. Not dead. Just asleep."

Howard stared at him. "What?"

"I'm not gonna be rescued for another 20 years. S.H.I.E.L.D.'s gonna find me. They're gonna wake me up."

"_What_?"

"And that was when I met Tony. Here, I'll show you." He reached back and pulled his wallet out of his pocket. Flipping quickly through the photos of the grandkids, he found the sleeve holding Harrison and Nat's photos and carefully pulled out the third photo hidden in between them. He handed it to a very confused Howard Stark, who looked down at it as Maria leaned over his arm to see, too.

"You with... Senator Ellis?" Howard asked blankly.

"President Ellis," Steve corrected him. "That was taken July 4, 2012. The day Tony and I were awarded the Medal of Freedom."

"That's _Tony_ with you?" Howard asked, startled, holding the photo closer to his face. Maria made a small impatient movement, and a few seconds later she pulled the photo out of Howard's hand and looked it over with hungry eyes.

"It _is_ him," she said in a suddenly shaky voice. "And he looks older." She let out a soft breath, her expression full of wonderment. "Howard, look! He looks even more like you than he does now." Her eyes were welling up, and Steve felt a wave of relief. He had been afraid they wouldn't believe him.

"What's with the _beard_?" Howard muttered, but he looked distinctly unnerved, and his hand was trembling a little as he reached out and took the photo back from his wife to scrutinize it again.

"He had gotten out of the weapons business by the time I met him," Steve continued. "He was running the company, doing a nice job of it. He came up with some pretty clever inventions. Miniaturized the arc reactor. Learned how to synthesize that new element you theorized, and put it to good use."

"You mean he did it?" Howard said abruptly, looking up from the photo in shock. "He actually _did_ it?"

"Well, he got your brains, didn't he?" Steve said with some amusement.

"Did he have a family?" Maria interjected, breathlessly eager.

Steve nodded. "He married a good woman. They had a little girl." He paused for a moment. "Wish I had a picture of her to show you, too. But she had your eyes, Howard. And the curve of your cheek," he added, shifting his gaze to Maria.

Howard was trying hard to stay gruff, while Maria was letting the tears run freely down her cheeks. "Her name?" she asked in a high voice.

"They named her Morgan," Steve said.

"A _boy's_ name?" she blurted out in surprise.

"Everyone was doing that in those days," Steve was quick to explain, as a confused expression crossed her face. "Actually, it kinda suited her."

"I don't understand," Howard said. "If you ended up in the future, with Tony, how are you here now?"

Steve settled on the explanation that would be easiest for Howard to understand. "I got access to a device. Something like the Tesseract, only it controlled time instead of space. I used it to come home. Back to where I belonged."

"So that's how she did it," Howard muttered, almost to himself. "Peggy. She really did have a crystal ball. She had _you_."

"I have some foreknowledge," Steve admitted. "I don't always know the details, but I have a general idea of the shape of the future." He frowned. "That's why I don't understand. You were supposed to have the serum in your trunk tonight, Howard. Five IV bags in a case. That's one of the things I was sure about. But now-"

"You think something's changed?" Howard asked, frowning.

"That isn't supposed to be possible." He looked at Howard. "Where do you keep the serum? Can I see it for myself?"

Howard nodded curtly. "I think we better. This way."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** Reviews are appreciated!_


	23. Chapter 23

_**Author's note:** This chapter is about twice as long as a normal one. Which is probably why it took me twice as long to write it. :-) But there just wasn't a good place to cut it in half, so you get it all in one gulp. _

_Thanks to distanceincrowdedrooms, jerseydanielgibson, Guests, kingmanaena, codedriver, girliemom, ravenclawdiadem16, SpanishGirl, sofiarose613, guiltypleasure 82, MagicLia16, fictionfrek101 and Figuratively Dying for your reviews! I hope you know they do make a difference. I have at times tweaked things when a reader has helped me see a problem, or a potential plot development that I hadn't considered taking, but which seems obvious once someone points it out. And of course it's always good to know someone is enjoying the fruits of my labor. You guys are the best. _

* * *

**6:48 p.m., December 16, 1991**

They left Maria by the Jaguar, still gazing at Tony's photo, and Howard led Steve down a long corridor off the main portion of the garage and into a small, unassuming room filled with a disorganized jumble of crates overflowing with spare parts. His face inscrutable, Howard shot a glance at Steve before reaching down into one of the boxes and doing something that Steve couldn't quite see.

There was a faint whirring sound, and unexpectedly a section of the tiled floor parted smoothly, revealing a set of stairs that disappeared into the darkness. Howard led the way down the steps and pressed his hand against a scanner on the wall, then punched a code into a keypad. A panel in the wall slid open, revealing a short, dimly lit corridor with a thick metal door at the end.

The door was propped open.

Steve glanced over at Howard. No need to ask if that door was supposed to be open; Howard looked both angry and alarmed. Without any need to communicate, they both moved forward and entered the room swiftly and silently.

There was a man inside. Just one. A safe in the wall was open, and he was moving something inside into a silver case, which he hastily shut and then turned around. He froze when he saw Steve and Howard standing there.

"Uh..." the guy said, his eyes widening. Down by his side, his hand gripped the handle of the case so tightly his knuckles were white.

"Randall? Just what do you think you're doing?" Howard demanded.

"You know this guy?" Steve asked.

"He does maintenance work for me."

Steve squinted his eyes slightly. "I don't think he's doing maintenance work in here."

"Yeah, no kidding," Howard said. "I think you better put that case down, pal."

"Oh yeah? Who's gonna make me?" Randall demanded with a sneer, suddenly producing a pistol from inside his jacket and pointing it at them. "The senior citizen brigade?"

Steve and Howard exchanged glances.

"Have you still got it?" Howard asked casually.

"Guess we're about to find out," Steve said.

"Got what?" Randall asked them both suspiciously after a beat.

"This," Steve said.

He threw a fist in the man's face.

Randall flew back and his body slammed against the wall before crumpling into a heap on the floor, where he lay without moving.

"Ah. You _do_ still have it," Howard said approvingly.

Steve rubbed his knuckles with a grimace. "Ow."

Howard looked at him, bemused. "Ow?"

"Don't tell me _you_ aren't feeling a touch of arthritis by now."

Howard bent down and grabbed the guy by the lapels of his jacket, moving him off the case he had fallen on top of. It had popped open and several IV bags had spilled out. One of them was leaking into a sticky blue puddle spreading out on the floor.

Howard groaned, looking in dismay at the mess. "Do you have _any_ idea how long it took me to make that?" he said irritably to no one in particular as he stooped to pick up the now-empty IV bag and read the label. "Major Jenkins. Damn it. She was one of my favorites."

Heaving a sigh, Howard carefully gathered up the remaining five IV bags and put them back in the case one by one.

"That guy wasn't doing this alone," Steve said with certainty. "He would have had an associate nearby to help him transport the serum away from the house."

Suddenly Howard looked alarmed. "Maria!"

They took off running up the stairs and back into the garage, Howard bringing the case with the remaining serum along. No point in leaving it in the safe, not when Hydra apparently knew the combination.

They burst through the door and found Maria standing by the Jaguar, still looking at Tony's photo. A man in a chauffeur's uniform with a Stark security badge clipped to the lapel was standing next to her, and Maria was telling him in a distracted voice without taking her eyes off the photo: "No need, Howard will drive us to the airport himself. But thank you, Johnson."

As one, Maria and Johnson looked up at Steve and Howard where they stood together breathless just inside the doorway. The chauffeur looked down at the case in Howard's hand, and his eyes widened.

He grabbed Maria roughly by the back of the neck and pulled her against him while he stuffed his other hand inside his suit jacket... but he never got a chance to pull out what was inside. Howard already had his hand-held laser out, and a tight beam of light shot out and struck the man in the chest.

The chauffeur dropped, smoke rising from the singed hole in his jacket.

Maria cried out, short and sharp, wobbling back on her high heels until she fell back against the car. She stayed there, mouth agape, while Howard and Steve split up and rapidly scanned the garage to see if anyone else was there. It appeared that for the moment, it was just the three of them.

"What is going on?!" Maria gasped when at last she found her voice again.

"They were trying to steal the serum," Howard said succinctly.

"Steve," Peggy's voice said tensely in his ear, and he reached up to touch the earpiece. "We have a problem. I can see men moving up the hill. A dozen or more. Two groups, one headed for the garage, one for the house. They didn't go past me. They must have been hidden somewhere on the property."

"Stand by," Steve said to her. "Howard, Peggy says there are men moving in on our position, and the house too."

Maria looked up from the chauffeur's body, horrified. "Tony! He's still in the house!"

"He isn't alone," Steve quickly reassured her. "I have someone with him." But even though Natty had a good grasp of hand fighting thanks to Mike's lessons, she was young and inexperienced and Steve knew he couldn't count on her being able to hold off a wave of intruders indefinitely.

"They're not gonna stop coming," Howard said grimly, holding the case of serum protectively across his chest. "We have to get the serum away from the house. Take it somewhere more secure."

"Before they send in their big hitter," Steve agreed. The Winter Soldier had already gotten much too close to Tony for comfort, and that couldn't happen again. He wouldn't let it.

"They have a big hitter?"

"Yeah."

Howard paused. "How big are we talking?"

"Like me," Steve said flatly. "But 50 years younger."

Howard swore.

"Where can you take it?" Steve asked.

"My friend has a private airstrip not far from here," Howard said as he strode decisively over to the trunk of his car and opened it. "It's where I keep my Cessnas hangared. We can be there in 10 minutes. I can fly the serum straight to the Pentagon." He threw the case in his trunk and slammed the lid. "Maria, get in." Sweat was beaded on his brow as he hurried over to the driver's side.

"Howard," Steve said.

Howard looked at him.

"I can go with you," Steve told him quietly, "or I can stay here and protect Tony."

"Stay with Tony," Maria said immediately from where she stood by the passenger door. Wisps of hair had escaped her bun and she still looked frightened, but her chin was up and her eyes were resolute.

"Stay with Tony," Howard agreed without hesitation. He reached into his suit pocket and tossed Steve something small and rectangular. He caught it one-handed and glanced down at it: it was an electronic access card.

Steve met Howard's eyes firmly. "I'll keep him safe," he promised. "Whatever it takes."

The Starks jumped in the car and Howard started the engine. Steve touched his earpiece. "The Starks are coming down the road in a silver Jaguar," he told Peggy. "They're headed for a private airstrip nearby and they need cover."

Peggy acknowledged crisply as the garage's door rolled up to let the cold winter air come spilling in... along with a handful of men dressed in black clothing. Howard floored the gas pedal and the engine roared as the Jaguar leapt forward. Without hesitation the men ran toward the car at full speed. Howard swerved deliberately and hit one of them, sending him flying into a sporty blue convertible. The other men shouted, more in anger than fear, and one of them lifted a crowbar and tried to smash the driver's side window as the Jaguar roared past, but he never got close enough; Steve had already grabbed him roughly around the middle and thrown him to the cement floor with a satisfying _thud_.

In moments, the Jaguar was out of the garage and tearing down the gravel road, its bright headlights cutting a swath through the dark night.

There were five men left standing, and they clearly had no intention of giving up on their mission: they dashed without hesitation toward a black Benz parked in the garage, one of them first stooping to pull a ring of keys out of the pocket of the fallen chauffeur. Another one took a casual swing at Steve's head as he ran past, although he didn't look particularly worried about the threat posed by an unarmed old man.

Steve ducked the punch and stuck his leg out, tripping the assailant and sending him sprawling to the floor. Within seconds he had caught up to the next man and push-kicked him, sending him flying into the man trying to get into the driver's seat of the Benz. The car keys went skittering across the floor and disappeared under another car.

Suddenly they all seemed a lot more worried about an old man than they had been a second ago. In moments he was surrounded by angry Hydra agents in a rush to get him out of the way so they could pursue their prize. The blows rained down fast and furious, and Steve felt his pulse racing in response as he began to deal out blows of his own.

It had been decades since Steve had been in a real fight. But he hadn't forgotten a thing, and if his body was slower and clumsier than it used to be, he was still what Dr. Erskine had made him.

And unlike his enemies, he wasn't here to steal and kill for power and domination. He was fighting for his friend.

The men worked together, fighting him like a pack of hyenas, their blows vicious and blindingly fast. It hurt more than he remembered it hurting. His strikes were not as precise as he wanted them to be. He felt like he was moving in slow-motion by his old standards.

But for all his flaws and their white-hot desperation, they could not stop him.

He punched one man in the face and he staggered back, falling against a stack of crates that crashed to the floor with a clatter as car parts came tumbling out. Without even thinking about it, Steve snatched up a hubcap that rolled near him, spun around, and flung it. It bounced off one head, careened unerringly toward another, and then came spinning back to his hand. Both men collapsed to the floor, unconscious, leaving only one man left. He was down on his hands and knees, fumbling around for the car keys amid the chaos, but now he stared up at Steve, fear and confusion warring on his face. Suddenly his eyes widened with recognition... and utter disbelief.

"_You_," he finally managed to spit out, and there was a world of hatred in the word.

"Me," Steve agreed mildly. He strode forward and instinctively the man furiously backpedaled, trying to get away from him, but it was no use. Seconds later, he took a hubcap to the face and joined his compatriots on the cold cement floor.

Steve didn't waste any time nursing his aching joints, but reached up to touch his earpiece. "Natty, where in the house are you and Tony?" he asked urgently.

There was a short pause, and then Natty said brightly, "Wow, you have your own movie theater in the basement?" and he heard Tony's voice in the background answering facetiously, "Doesn't everyone?"

"Keep him there if you can," Steve told Natty as he ran out of the garage, trying not to limp, and headed for the house. "Eyes up. Stay sharp. You two may not be alone."

* * *

**6:55 p.m., December 16, 1991**

Peggy crouched behind her car door, gun steady in her hand despite the bone-chilling wind that had started up as soon as the sun went down. It blew straight through her winter coat and whipped her hair around her face as the Starks' Jaguar came tearing down the hill, its tires crunching on the gravel and its headlights illuminating the trees edging the road. There didn't seem to be anyone in pursuit, probably because of the grunts and crashes she could hear coming through her earpiece: undoubtedly Steve taking care of business in the garage.

The Jaguar slowed as it approached the barrier at the guard gate, and in the light of the lamppost placed there Peggy could see Howard leaning through the driver's side window, gesturing vehemently at the guard standing in the booth. Peggy frowned; the guard was not rushing to raise the gate and lower the road spikes, even though there was no question that's what Howard was telling him to do.

And then the guard had a gun in his hands, and he was pointing it at Howard.

Without hesitation Peggy left the safety of the car door that was shielding her and dashed toward the booth, her own weapon in hand. Howard and Maria both had their hands up as the guard barked at them to get out of the car. He didn't see Peggy, dressed in dark clothing against the gloom of the night, until she had already come around the car and had him in her sights.

"Drop it," Peggy said.

The man turned to look at her, and an expression of incredulity crossed his face when he saw who was holding him at gunpoint.

"Yes, I'm an old woman," Peggy said acerbically. "And if you're wondering whether I have the guts to shoot, you should know I already have Hydra blood on my hands, and a clear conscience to match. Now drop it."

There was a long, breathless moment in which none of them moved.

The guard made a sudden movement, swiveling his gun to point it in her direction, but he never made it that far. Peggy squeezed the trigger, the silencer muffling the _bang_ into a _pop_, and the man dropped, his gun hitting the ground only a moment before he did.

"Why do they never believe you?" Howard asked in genuine puzzlement, leaning out of the car window to survey her handiwork.

"If they were smart, they wouldn't be Hydra," Peggy replied crisply. She grabbed one of the man's arms and started to drag him. Howard scrambled out of his seat and helped her maneuver the body into the guard booth, out of sight from passer-by. Then he pulled the lever, and the gate lifted up as the road spikes sunk into the ground, opening the way for him.

Howard looked at her seriously now. "Peggy..." he said.

She smiled a little. "I know, Howard. I know."

He reached out and squeezed her hand briefly, his hand clasping warmly around her cold one, his eyes meeting hers gratefully. Then he got back in the driver's seat.

"I'll follow you," Peggy called back to him as she strode back to her car. "Drive fast and don't look back."

"I always do." Howard rolled up the window and put the pedal to the metal, the Jaguar's engine roaring as it leapt into motion. Slamming her door shut, Peggy threw her car into gear and followed hot on his heels.

She was hard-pressed to keep up with him as he navigated the tree-lined road, his Jaguar handling the curves of the dirt road more smoothly than her Ford sedan, but she managed to keep him in her sights. That's why, a few minutes later, she saw it the moment a car suddenly pulled out onto the road right in front of him, forcing Howard to hit his brakes. Peggy hit hers too, only just avoiding rear-ending him.

It was immediately clear that the other driver hadn't simply missed seeing their cars coming in the dark; it continued to brake, forcing Howard to slow even more. The Jaguar crossed the dotted line as if to pass it on the left, but the other car swerved to the center of the road, blocking its passage. In the glow of her headlights, Peggy saw Howard look back over his shoulder at her. Maria was clutching the safety handle on the car's ceiling, looking nervous.

The Jaguar moved back to the right. Peggy knew instantly what Howard wanted her to do, and she was only too happy to oblige. Stepping on the gas, she swerved well onto the left shoulder of the road, kicking up dust as she passed the Jaguar and came up from behind and to the left of the other car, a black one that was difficult to see in the dark.

She glanced over as their two cars pulled even. There were the dark silhouettes of two men inside, and she caught sight of a gun being leveled at her from the passenger seat.

There was no time to question the advisability of it, she simply acted on instinct. Wrenching her steering wheel to the right, Peggy sideswiped the black car and pushed it off the road, both of them veering across the shoulder and into the weeds.

Everything happened so quickly there was hardly time to register it. The other car jounced and jolted down a steep incline that suddenly opened up before them, fishtailing wildly in the light of her headlights, narrowly missing first one tree and then another before disappearing into the underbrush, followed seconds later by a loud, sustained crunching sound.

Peggy was busy desperately trying to regain control of her own car, hands white on the steering wheel and brake pedal pressed to the floorboards, when one tire went down into a deep hole just as another struck a large rock. The car bucked underneath her and she lurched to the side, the seatbelt tightening across her chest but unable to stop her head from smacking against the window. Stunned by the blow, vision blurring, she couldn't avoid all the trees anymore than the other car had been able to. Her car came to an abrupt halt against a thick trunk and she hit her head again, this time against the steering wheel.

Silence fell. Her engine had stopped. Grimacing, Peggy lifted her head off the steering wheel and gingerly felt her head. No blood, but it was extremely tender. An acrid smell was filling the car. Hastily she unbuckled her seatbelt and leaned over to open the glovebox, fumbling around until she felt the smooth weight of a flashlight. Gripping it in her right hand, she found the door handle with her left.

She was afraid she would be trapped in the car, but the hood had taken all the damage; the door opened easily and Peggy staggered out onto the uneven ground, head throbbing fiercely. She pointed the flashlight down the incline where the black car had gone, scanning rapidly through the trees. She couldn't spot the car, although it must be close, but its engine had gone silent too, and she couldn't hear anyone trying to get out to continue the pursuit. Making a quick decision, she turned and headed back toward the road, having enough presence of mind to make sure she still had her gun in its holster. She had the flashlight to help her avoid tripping on rocks and bushes, but waves of dizziness made her slow and clumsy and it took longer than she wanted to get back to the road.

The Jaguar wasn't in sight, and as she pointed the flashlight in the direction they had been driving, the beam revealed a long, sturdy fence topped with barbed wire not far from the road. It looked exactly like the type of fence that would surround a private airstrip, and suddenly Peggy's heart leapt inside her chest as she began moving as quickly as she could along the road, her breath coming out in frosty huffs. Was it possible Howard and Maria had made it? Could they be getting in their plane with the serum right now?

And then the roar of a motorcycle engine shattered the night.

* * *

Howard's access card got Steve into the house without any trouble, and swiftly and quietly he made his way downstairs. It wasn't hard to guess which way the home theater was; one hallway was lined with movie posters depicting Howard's favorite movie stars from back in the day, and the doorway at the end was covered in a velvety red curtain. Steve knew for sure he was in the right place when he heard Tony's voice muffled through the curtain, and Natty's higher one answering him.

Steve cautiously pulled aside the curtain a crack and peered in. A curved hallway, dim but outlined with white running lights along the floor, led into the theater. He could just see the corner of the big screen from where he stood. A short set of stairs to his left led upward, presumably to the projector booth.

A series of methodical clicks sounded from the top of the stairs, and Steve tensed: that had been the unmistakable sound of bullets being loaded into a gun.

He slipped through the curtain, went up the steps and turned the corner. The movie projector dominated the small room, its lens pointing through a glass partition toward the big screen of the theater below. A man was standing at the back of the booth, out of sight of anyone standing below, his head down as he focused on loading the gun in his hands.

The man jumped visibly when he looked up and saw Steve standing there, and he pointed the gun instinctively, but Steve quickly put both his hands up to show they were empty and mouthed, "Hail Hydra."

The man stared at him, visibly disappointed. "_You're_ my reinforcements?" he hissed.

"I'm all there is."

The man looked irritated, but he lowered the gun and beckoned Steve forward urgently.

"What the hell happened?" the man demanded in a fierce whisper when he got close. "Moran never showed up here, went completely radio-silent. My men couldn't even find him on the road. And the whole time the asset was just standing around the rendezvous site with his hands in his pockets!" He shook his head grimly. "We had to call Pierce himself and get him on the line to give the asset his next instructions. Pierce was furious. Heads are gonna roll when we get back to headquarters. We're gonna have to tell him something. Something to shift the blame." He was trying to hide the fear in his eyes and doing a poor job of it.

"Stark obviously had security we didn't know about," Steve replied in a low voice. He managed to keep his tone casual, but it was difficult to hide the crushing disappointment: if Pierce had given Bucky new orders, then they would override what Mike had told him to do, just as surely as Mike had overridden Moran's orders. And if that was true...

"We have people following Stark now," Steve continued in an undertone, carefully keeping his emotions in check. "In the meantime, what are we gonna do with them?" He cocked his head toward the glass partition through which Natty and Tony's voices could be heard in the theater below, discussing which movie to watch.

"We're standing by until the serum is secured," the man murmured. "They're hoping to get Stark's research notes, too, but we don't know where they are. Junior down there's an ideal hostage for that, but this would have worked a hell of a lot better if we could have taken him back at the airport. It's gonna be a lot harder to keep the scene clean here. I dunno how we'll persuade the cops that-" He broke off in visible frustration and shook his head again, a muscle in his jaw clenching. "Pierce is gonna kill us."

"Who else is in the house?" Steve asked.

"I don't have much of a team left," he said grimly. "But I've got a man at the side door in the kitchen and another standing by with a car just outside it. A lookout's posted on the roof above the front door. And our guard down in the security booth is already scrubbing the surveillance tapes."

Steve nodded seriously. "Good to know."

"When it's time, I'll go down and take the kid," the man said softly. "You deal with the girl. I dunno who she is and frankly I don't care. Just make sure her body ends up somewhere it won't be found. Got it?"

"I hate to be the one to break it to you," Steve said mildly, "but that isn't what's going to happen today."

He stepped behind the man and without hesitation wrapped his arm around the man's throat and yanked him back against his own chest, locking him in a tight and terrible embrace. The gun fell to the carpeted floor with a muffled thump, and silently the man began to struggle.

He fought desperately, trying to pry Steve's arm away, slamming his elbows back repeatedly, and finally wrenching his whole weight from side to side trying to escape that unyielding grip. Tony's laugh incongruously drifted up from the theater below as the man's fists beat uselessly against Steve's arm in one final act of desperation.

When he finally went still, Steve took time only to hide the body and the weapon, and then he was off to find the others.

* * *

**7:01 p.m., December 16, 1991**

Peggy ran as fast as she could. Her head reeled from the impacts of the crash, and waves of nausea roiled in sync with the pulsing pain in her temples, but she forced herself forward anyway, flashlight bobbing, following the road unerringly toward the roar of the motorcycle engine. It was close. She was close. Her heart fluttered painfully as she ran, and she pressed her hand against her chest with a grimace. She knew shouldn't be running this fast. Sarah had warned her against it a few years back. But there was still a chance she could make it. If she could get to Howard and Maria in time, before Bucky did…

A loud, metallic crash assaulted her ears, coming from around a bend in the road. Desperation surged through her veins, and Peggy pushed herself to run even faster, ignoring the twinges in her chest that were now becoming sharp stabs. Through her ragged gasps she thought she heard Maria's voice crying out "Howard!"

It seemed to take an eternity to get there, but finally she came around the bend and registered in a single glance that the Jaguar was smashed against the airstrip's fence, its engine in flames, with the trunk and both front doors hanging open. There was a man standing at the edge of the road not far from the wreckage. A man dressed in black, with the red light of the flames glinting off one metallic arm.

He raised his arm and pointed a gun at the top of the fence. A single shot rang out, muffled by a silencer. The faint sound of tinkling glass was heard, and then he turned his back and strode toward the waiting motorcycle, a silver case in his hand.

Peggy shoved aside the anguish, the pounding pain in her heart and in her skull, and the knowledge that she was much too far away to get a good shot, and pointed her gun, willing her hand to steady despite her shortness of breath… and then lowered her weapon helplessly as the motorcycle roared away into the night. She had no way to pursue him, and it didn't matter, anyway. The damage was already done. The Winter Soldier was going to take his prize back to his masters, deviating from that course only long enough to retrieve the surveillance tapes from the airstrip's control booth first. Everything that was fated to happen would happen. Just as they had known it would.

The motorcycle engine faded away into the distance.

Peggy slumped over, one hand pressed against the rough bark of a tree for support as she panted for air, tears blurring her vision as the realization sunk in. The flashlight slipped from her grip and hit the ground with a thump, its thin beam flickering out.

Too late. She was too late.

But when the wild galloping of her heart had slowed to a manageable pace, she lifted her chin and straightened up, holstering her gun and brushing the dirt from her hands. She went straight to the Jaguar and leaned through the open car door, where Howard was slumped forward, unmoving.

She placed a gentle hand on his chest and pulled him away from the steering wheel, leaning him back limply against the seat. Blood was streaked down his face. Her fingers went to the pulse point on the neck, even though she already knew what she would feel: nothing. He was still warm, but he was gone.

"I'm sorry, Howard," she whispered, sick with grief. "I tried. I tried…"

Hot tears slowly made their way down her cold cheeks, but she kept her hand on his chest and let them slide down. She had known it would end this way, had known it all along, but it didn't hurt any less now that it had come. She'd known him since she was 23 years old. Longer even than she'd known Steve. He'd been by turns charming and maddening… and she didn't know what she would do without him. Swallowing down the grief that threatened to choke her, she reached up and gently closed his eyes.

Then she made her way to the other side of the car and checked on Maria, just to be sure. But there was nothing to be done for her, either. Peggy's eyes drifted down and saw that Maria was holding a photo in her still fingers: Tony showing off his Medal of Honor, a roguish grin creasing his face as he rested his arm casually on the President's shoulder. Steve was standing on the other side, looking serious with his own medal to match gleaming on his chest. Peggy carefully took the photo from Maria's fingers and tucked it into her own breast pocket just as a car came around the bend, its headlights sweeping across her.

The car stopped, and a woman opened the door and came hurrying over to Peggy.

"What happened?" she cried out, taking in the sight of the wrecked car with alarm. "Are they hurt?"

Peggy shook her head slightly to clear her thoughts, forcing herself to adopt an American accent as she responded, knowing that she must not stick in the woman's memory as anything out of the ordinary. "They're already gone," she said quietly.

Horror blossomed on the woman's face, and she hesitantly peered inside the car before gasping. "The Starks! Oh, God!" She paused for a long moment. "Are- are you sure? Maybe-" She put her hand over her mouth to cover a shaky sob.

"I'm sure," Peggy said. "I checked. There's nothing we can do."

"Are you all right?" the woman asked tremulously. "Were you in the car with them?"

"No," Peggy said, eyes distant. "I was walking. I saw them swerve to miss a deer."

The woman took in a shaky breath. "Okay. Okay. My house is just a few minutes away. I'll call the police. You better come with me. It's warm in the car; you must be freezing."

"No thank you," Peggy said softly. "You go. I'll stay here with them."

And she did, alone in the darkness and the silence, until she heard sirens in the distance. Then she slipped into the cover of the trees and began the long, chilly walk back to her car.

"Steve?" she said softly into her comm. "I'm sorry, darling. It's over."

* * *

Natty perched on the edge of her velvety seat, every muscle tense, her body twisted to look back toward the entrance of the theater. A while back she had heard some soft sounds coming from nearby: faint whispers, and then a few muffled thumps. Nothing loud enough to alert Tony to anything out of the ordinary — after all, his hearing was not as sensitive as hers — but she had a pretty good idea that Grandpa had been nearby, taking care of a... well, a problem.

She couldn't hear anything unusual now, but the fact that Grandpa hadn't given her an all-clear told her that she still needed to be on her guard.

"Sit back," Tony said from beside her, putting a hand on her shoulder and pulling her back against the cushioned seat. "_Relax_." He picked up a remote, pointed it at the projector behind them, and started the movie.

She mostly kept her face toward the screen after that, but still she was listening intently. Listening for any sign of trouble. But the movie played on and nothing happened, until a loud musical chime sounded through the speakers, clashing momentarily with the soundtrack of the movie.

"What was that?" Natty asked, looking around.

"Doorbell. Just ignore it," Tony said. "Probably someone to see my parents. None of my friends know I'm back yet."

"Natty, answer the door," Grandpa murmured unexpectedly in her ear. "It's the police." There was a short pause. "We didn't change anything for Howard and Maria," he continued softly. "They're here to give Tony the news."

Natty's heart sank down to her toes, and she looked over at Tony for a long moment. He was looking up at the screen, lights flickering across his face as the scene played out. He didn't know what had happened, and oh, what she wouldn't give to keep him in the bliss of that ignorance! To keep him here in this time, when he had two parents and everything that kids their age dreamed of, when there was no Ironmonger or Whiplash, no Loki or Mandarin, no Ultron or Thanos. A time when he wasn't Iron Man, just Tony Stark, and he didn't carry the weight of the world on his shoulders.

But he would have to face all that. He would have to grow up. As Natty was, too. Already the person she had been just a day ago seemed like a distant dream.

The doorbell chimed again, and Natty steeled herself and stood up. "Where is the bathroom?" she asked Tony.

"Right outside the curtain." Tony gestured with his thumb without looking at her. "To the left."

"Okay. I'll be right back."

But when she was out in the hallway, she walked past the bathroom door and headed for the stairs. "Grandpa, where are you?" she whispered.

"On the roof," he whispered back. "I just took care of the last of the problems. Try to keep the police in the front room. There are some things in the house and the garage they shouldn't see. But don't worry. They aren't here to investigate. They'll just want to talk to him and then they'll leave."

She had reached the top of the stairs. Red and blue lights were flashing through the beautiful fan-shaped window above the double doors, glinting off the ornaments adorning the Christmas tree in the foyer. Heart beating quickly, Natty went straight to the door and opened it.

A uniformed officer, an older man with his police cap in his hand, was standing on the step. A younger officer stood a few steps behind him.

"Miss?" the older man said. "Antonio Perez, Village Police. Is Tony Stark at home?" His face was sober.

Natty gripped the door handle hard so he wouldn't see her hands shaking.

"Yes," she said. "Please come in."

She left them in the music room and hurried back to the theater. Reaching over Tony, she took the remote and paused the movie.

"Tony?" she said into the sudden quiet. "The police are here."

He stared at her blankly. "What?"

"They want to talk to you."

His brow slowly creased. "The police? Are you messing with me?"

"No," she said. "They're in the music room. They want to talk to you."

"They asked for _me_?"

"By name."

Tony blinked several times, and then he stood up, looking around himself uncertainly for a moment before striding out of the room with a sudden swiftness. Natty hurried to keep up with him.

"What is this?" Tony asked as he entered the music room, looking back and forth between the two officers. "What's the problem?"

"Tony Stark?"

"Yes." Tony's gaze was fierce, but there was a growing fear behind it. "What's going on?"

"Why don't you sit down, son?" the older officer said gently.

They explained to him what had happened, in a direct but gentle way. They were as kind as they could be about it, but by the time they left the house, Tony was hunched up in a ball, clinging to Natty like a life preserver, tears soaking the front of her shirt as his shoulders heaved with sobs.

She cried with him, because there was nothing else she could do for him.

* * *

Eventually they both cried themselves dry, and sat together on the couch limp and exhausted. The silence filled the room. Natty couldn't think of any words of comfort that wouldn't ring hollow, and for once in his life Tony didn't seem to want to talk, beyond the bewildered "Why? _Why_?" he had kept blurting out at the first.

She had just opened her mouth to say something anyway, no matter how inadequate, when she heard the front door open, and a man's heavy footsteps entered.

A bloom of fear managed to penetrate Natty's exhaustion. Who else had access to the house, that they wouldn't knock, but simply walk in as if they belonged there? Where was Grandpa? He had been watching from the roof before, but she hadn't heard from him in what seemed like a long time. What if he had missed one of the Hydra agents? What if he had been lured away or taken down?

Suddenly alert, Natty gently disentangled herself from Tony's grip and stood up, placing herself between Tony and the entrance to the music room, arms spreading out protectively. She was ready, if she had to...

A man walked into the room, his tread slow and deliberate. A silver-haired man in a suit, with an impeccably dignified bearing although he was stooped with age. Not Grandpa. Someone she didn't recognize.

"Master Stark," he said gently. He had a British accent.

Tony looked up with bloodshot eyes.

"Jarvis!" he said hoarsely. In seconds he was up and had thrown his arms around the man.

Jarvis put his arms around Tony in return. "I heard what happened," he said gently, patting Tony's back. "I'm so sorry."

"How are _you_ here?" Tony asked in a dazed kind of way. "I thought you lived in London."

Jarvis cleared his throat slightly. "I... happened to be in the neighborhood." He met Natty's eyes and nodded to her slightly. "Now, I don't want you to worry yourself about any of the arrangements, Master Stark. I'll take care of everything. And I can stay as long as you like. You shouldn't be alone right now."

"Thank you." Tony's voice cracked with emotion, and his fists bunched up Jarvis' suit as he gripped the fabric tightly. "Thank you."

"Miss?" Jarvis said to Natty over Tony's shoulder. "My driver is just outside the door. She can take you back home now."

A little confused, Natty glanced out the window. An Oldsmobile was parked outside, illuminated by the front porch lights, and a blonde woman was standing beside it. It was Aunt Sarah. Surprised, Natty looked back at Jarvis.

"Thank you for your help," he said quietly, holding her gaze. "We won't forget it."

Feeling strangely numb, Natty went outside, where the sharp frosty air woke her up a little. Aunt Sarah held out her arms, and Natty gratefully let herself be embraced by familiar arms as Aunt Sarah whispered in her ear that she had done well, and it was over now. Jarvis had everything under control.

"All the... the men are gone?" Natty asked.

"They're gone," Aunt Sarah quietly confirmed. "They think they have what they came for. It'll be weeks or even months before they find out the serum's no good to them. And with the inventor gone, they'll have no reason to come back." Natty nodded, feeling grateful for that much, at least.

"You see the light at the bottom of the hill?" Aunt Sarah said then, pointing. "The guard station? Bram is down there, wearing a security uniform. He can make a portal for you and you can both go home now."

"He's... wearing a uniform?" Natty repeated, confused.

"Someone needed to let the police through the gate when they came, and the real guard, well..." Aunt Sarah trailed off.

"Oh," Natty whispered. She didn't really want to know any more about that. "But... how did you and Bram get here?" She thought they'd been in Bethesda all this time.

"I opened a portal to the golf course again a little while ago. Grandma had Jarvis pick us up from there. She'd arranged for him to be waiting nearby, knowing... what might happen tonight. Anyway, we dropped off Bram at the guard station and went on to get Grandma."

"Grandma? I thought she was in her car right down there."

Aunt Sarah sighed. "It's a long story. There were a couple of wrecked cars in the woods that needed to be portaled away, and then I sent Grandma home to Dave so he could check her over. She wasn't feeling very well."

Natty didn't really understand, but she was too tired to want to hear the whole story anyway. As long as everyone was safe now, that was all that mattered. "My mom and dad are really okay?"

"They're fine. You can see your mother in just a few minutes. Bram will take you to our house."

Natty paused. "Aren't you coming too?"

"I need to help Grandpa clean up a few things here at the house first." It was only then Natty noticed that Aunt Sarah wasn't looking very well herself; she was noticeably pale. She saw Natty's concerned look and said before she could even ask: "I'm not quite a hundred percent, sweetie, but I can manage. I just need to make a few more portals for him, and then we'll come home too."

"Okay."

She let herself be hugged again and then obediently trudged down the long gravel road alone. And it was only when she got to the bottom of the hill, where her cousin Bram was nervously pacing in front of the guard station waiting for her, that Natty realized she had forgotten to tell Tony goodbye.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** This chapter was a bit wrenching to write. I hope it made sense and satisfied everyone's expectations. __Please leave a review and let me know what you thought. _


	24. Chapter 24

_**Author's note:** Thanks to Cariana, jerseydanielgibson, "Guest" reviewers (lots of them this chapter for some reason — welcome, everyone!), Apex85, Nimrodel 101, kingmanaena Guiltypleasure82, girliemom, codedriver, LilyAnneBlack, MagicLia16 and distanceincrowdedrooms for your reviews. _

* * *

**December 26, 1991**

It was a strange and somber Christmas season for the whole family, beginning with the public fallout over the death of the Starks and the subsequent funeral, a day Peggy struggled to get through — not only because of her grief but also because of the lingering symptoms of her concussion, explained away to her colleagues at S.H.I.E.L.D. as the result of a fall in her home.

It was the kind of incident that would have prompted calls for her retirement, given her age, if she hadn't already announced her departure would take place just before the holidays. And so she gritted her teeth and powered through a retirement party that should have been a joyful celebration of her accomplishments over a long career, if not for her sadness over the Starks and her fiercely aching head.

Steve was more worried about her than he would like to admit. One of the consequences of growing old was that injuries just didn't heal as fast as they used to, and something inside him recoiled every time he saw the discoloration of the bruises on her head, not quite hidden by her waves of silver hair. He could not stop himself from fussing over her at home, and for once she let him do it without insisting that she was fine.

He let himself grieve for Howard, careful to take for himself the same advice he'd been giving to others for so many years. He had the time for it; the VA had hosted a retirement party for him earlier in the month, although his looked very different from Peggy's, with far fewer attendees and no VIPs. Just an intimate group of grateful patients, and a handful of fellow therapists and friends. It was bittersweet to close the door on that chapter of his life, but now he could give his full concentration to his family, something he'd been looking forward to for a while now.

Mike came home from the hospital in time for Christmas. If there was a silver lining, it was that Tien bounced back from her injury quickly, and she was able to care for him and keep the home running with her usual quiet competence, calming her children's worries and making sure they had a merry Christmas despite all the upheaval. Sarah, too, recovered quickly enough to host the combined family dinner after everyone had spent Christmas morning in their own homes opening their presents.

It was a subdued celebration for the adults and the older children who had been involved in everything that happened, but the joy of the younger children made them all smile, and they were quietly grateful that Tony had been spared, and that their own family had made it through alive, if not unscathed.

They got together again the day after Christmas to hold a follow-up meeting of the Captain America Club, but first they had to wait for Dave and Sarah to usher their younger kids out the door to visit a neighbor's house while they met. Steve got Peggy settled in a comfortable chair with a cup of tea and then left her and Tien making plans for writing Peggy's memoirs. Feeling restless, Steve wandered around the house instead of joining them.

He passed Mike in the hallway, who was pacing back and forth while talking on the phone — with his car insurance company, it sounded like — and had the same look on his face that everyone has when they talk to insurance companies. Steve had worn the same expression himself a few days earlier, and he gave his son a sympathetic look and a pat on the back as he passed him on his way to the front room.

There he found Natty alone, sitting on the window seat with her arms wrapped around her knees, looking at the snow falling outside. Steve went to sit by her and put his arm around her shoulders. She looked up at him and smiled a little sadly.

"So what did you think of Tony?" he asked her, guessing what was on her mind.

Natty took a long time to answer. "He was a mess," she said at last. "And I liked him. Very much."

"Yeah," Steve said with a small smile, squeezing her shoulders. "That's Tony, all right."

She sighed deeply. "He must have had a miserable Christmas."

"I know," Steve said softly. "But he wasn't alone. Jarvis will take good care of him. He'll be okay."

"I know."

The snow continued to drift down, blanketing the houses, and they watched it in silence together for several minutes.

"Do you think I'll see him again?" Natty asked softly then.

"I don't know," Steve said slowly. "I'm not sure when you would have the chance."

Just then they both heard footsteps coming, and looked over to see Sarah enter the room.

"Dad?" she said, and Steve immediately noticed she had an odd look on her face. "Can you come upstairs for a second? Steven wants to talk to you."

"Steven?" Steve frowned. "I thought he was going to your friend's house while we had our family meeting." Dave and Sarah's younger two, Amanda and Joe, had just gone over, and could be seen across the street and two doors down, bundled up and gleefully building a snowman with some other kids in the neighborhood.

"That's what he wants to talk to you about," Sarah said.

So Steve left Natty sitting on the window seat and followed Sarah up the stairs and into the room Steven shared with his little brother Joe. Dave was already waiting, sitting on Steven's bed. Steven himself was pacing back and forth in front of his bed, hands clasped behind him, clutching a rosary that he was going through methodically, pushing bead after bead along the string with his thumb, eyes distant.

The walls of his half of the room were almost completely papered over with sketches that he had done over the years — the more childish ones were mostly covered now by the more recent, better-executed ones — but the desktop was neatly organized and the floor didn't have a speck of clutter on it. Not like Joe's half of the room, which looked like a tornado had struck. But Steven liked his things to be as orderly as his thoughts, rarely spoken out loud but always carefully considered. He didn't have as many friends at school as the other kids, something Sarah and Dave worried about sometimes, although he never seemed unhappy about that. At 12, he hadn't quite hit his big growth spurt, but he had always acted older than his age and didn't seem to belong in the same category as his 8-year-old brother anymore, even if he wasn't built like a teenager yet.

Sarah came in behind Steve and closed the door, then shoved aside the pile of blankets and toys on Joe's bed so that she and Steve could down.

Steven looked at him seriously. "I want to come to this meeting, Grandpa," he said matter-of-factly.

"Your birthday is coming up pretty soon, and then you can join the Captain America Club," Steve said, although he suddenly felt an odd rush move through him. Steven didn't have any of his little sister Amanda's brash, demanding personality, but that had been more of a statement than a request.

"The thing is," Steven said, slowly and deliberately, "I think I kinda already joined."

Sarah glanced at Steve. "He asked me if you were Steve Rogers, Dad," she said quietly. "And, uh... that was when I came to get you."

"You don't really have to answer, Grandpa," Steven said calmly. "I know."

Steve looked at him with wonderment. "How?" he asked.

Steven shrugged one shoulder. "There were a lot of things, I guess. A while back I stopped sleeping like I used to. I wake up at 3 or 4 in the morning and can't get back to sleep. But I'm not tired. My mind just explodes with ideas, and my body itches to move, and I can't stay in bed anymore. Sometimes I get up and sketch until it's time to get ready for school. But sometimes, I-" He looked at both his parents a little sheepishly, and then admitted, "Sometimes I go down to the track at the high school and sprint it out for a while."

"In the middle of the night?" Dave exclaimed.

"It isn't as hard to see in the dark as it used to be. I did crash and burn on the asphalt once, trying the hurdles, but that was just because I'm a klutz." He shrugged again. "And it barely even hurt; the scrapes were gone by morning. That was when things really started to get weird. That, and the fact that when I was up in the middle of the night, I could hear you guys awake sometimes too." He looked at Sarah, and clarified: "You and Bram. Going down to the basement and doing I don't know what. I could hear the weirdest things. Kind of a crackling or hissing sound. I haven't figured that part out yet. I hear Maggie in her room at night too, but she just crinkles paper. Which probably explains how she always gets her homework done even when she babysits all day."

"Wow," Sarah murmured under her breath. "That happened so early for you."

"I don't mind," Steven said quickly. "I kinda like being alone at night. There's time to think. Get things done without people interrupting me. You know that series of sketches I've been working on? Heroes through history? I did most of those at night. And that's actually what helped me figure out what was happening." He took a deep breath. "After I did St. George I decided to draw Steve Rogers. He was kinda an obvious choice, since I was named after him. But as I was drawing him, well..." He glanced over at the sketch in question, which was stuck to the wall above his bed. "-it was hard not to notice that Captain America and Grandpa have the exact same profile. I had sketched you the month before, Grandpa, when I did everyone in the family. I have everyone's face pretty well memorized now. That was another thing that happened to me. My memory is crazy good now. I can see something once and be able to draw it right. I couldn't do that before."

"So you knew just from that?" Dave asked with puckered brow.

"Well, I read Grandpa's comics with a different eye after I noticed how similar they were," Steven said coolly. "And it all made sense. That he didn't die-" He paused, and corrected himself, locking eyes with Steve. "-that _you_ didn't die in the ice. All those adventures with the Avengers... they had the ring of truth to them. I didn't see it before. And it explained the changes that were happening to me. But Grandpa, you pretty much admitted it over the summer, when you told Joe that you and Grandma were the founding members of the Captain America Club."

Steve smiled ruefully. "I guess I did."

"You mean you've known for _months_?" Sarah asked incredulously. "Steven, why on earth didn't you _say_ something?"

"I don't know," he said with a shrug. "I just wanted time to have it to myself, I guess. Figure out what it all meant. I wasn't scared anymore once I knew what it was."

"You're a funny kid." Dave pulled Steven down to sit on the bed next to him and gave him a rough hug with one arm. "Too smart for your own good. I'm proud of you."

"So you're okay with all this?" Sarah asked him, going to sit by his other side and putting her arm around him too.

"Yeah, I'm okay." Steven looked around at all of them. "Our family's pretty cool, I think. And I can't wait to find out what you and Bram were doing in the basement, Mom."

"Oh, that," Sarah said. "We were practicing magic spells."

Steven flashed a rare full-watt smile. "Ha, ha, Mom, very funny."

"You goof." Sarah reached out and messed up his hair. "You read Grandpa's comics, didn't you? Did you or did you not see people doing magic in them?"

Steven paused. "You serious?"

"Yeah."

Steven blinked several times. "But... why would you need to? I thought maybe you were secretly working for S.H.I.E.L.D. too, like Uncle Mike. I mean, what was all that stuff that happened a couple weeks ago? When you kicked us all out of the house and then when we got home, Aunt Tien and Uncle Mike and Grandma had all been in car accidents, and Natty and Harrison and Bram were all freaked out about something but not talking about it. That was something for S.H.I.E.L.D., wasn't it?"

"It's a long story," Sarah said. She quickly explained about their serum research and its magical component, and everything they had done to protect the Starks from Hydra. Steven didn't say much — his rare burst of talkativeness had already subsided — but he absorbed it all with deep attention and seemed to be tucking it away for future pondering. Finally, when he understood enough, the four of them headed back downstairs to begin the family meeting.

"What's _he_ doing here?" Harrison asked when Steven settled down on the couch across from him.

"He's just been inducted into the club," Sarah explained.

"What, early?" Bram asked with a frown.

"He figured it out himself," Dave said simply.

"Way to go, bro," Maggie whispered to him with a delighted smile spreading across her face, as Bram gave his little brother a high-five.

"We need to talk about Tony Stark," Peggy said briskly, capturing everyone's attention despite remaining in her seat, knowing better than to push herself too hard after her head injury. "He's safe for now, but we need to make a long-term plan. Hydra seems to have regarded Howard Stark as their golden goose, and it's only a matter of time before they realize that Tony could be useful to them for all the same reasons."

"I promised Howard and Maria that I would keep him safe," Steve said quietly. "For now, that means keeping him out of Hydra's reach."

"Didn't you say Jarvis was going back to work for him?" Steven piped up from his mother's side.

Peggy nodded. "He's one of the few people we know we can trust. I didn't tell him absolutely everything, but he knows enough to keep an eye out for Hydra infiltrations."

"But that isn't a permanent solution," Mike said. "Jarvis is nearly 80, and he has his limits. He can handle Tony's household and personal affairs, yes, but he won't be deeply involved in the business."

"We should embed someone at Stark Industries," Peggy agreed. "An employee, someone who works with Tony closely enough to keep him safe even from the dangers he isn't aware of."

Mike lifted an eyebrow. "You mean, someone like Happy Hogan? Or Pepper Potts?"

"They'll come along in their time," Steve said. "Not as quickly as I'd like. We need a stopgap."

"Maybe the person we embed is the person who made sure those two crossed paths with Tony to begin with," Mike suggested.

"It's certainly possible," Peggy said. "Our man, or woman, whoever we get, could steer the correct people toward him, and do what they can to keep any bad actors at arm's length. So we need to choose carefully. This is a high-stakes, long-term assignment."

Mike sighed heavily. "This is the same problem we had with protecting Howard. Someone with S.H.I.E.L.D. training would be ideal for the job, but it's hard to know for sure who we can trust. Especially considering the kind of insider information we'd have to share with them. It's going to be hard to explain to them how we can foresee certain events without telling them our family's whole story... and that would endanger both them _and_ us."

A short silence fell, which was broken by Harrison.

"Let me do it," he said, leaning forward with eyes intent. "And don't tell me I'm only 15," he added fiercely before anyone could react. "You said you wanted someone with S.H.I.E.L.D. training, Dad, and I _have_ been trained by a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, one of the best."

Mike opened his mouth and then closed it again, shooting a sideways look at Tien. Everyone else turned to look at her, too.

"He wouldn't start until after high school?" she asked after a beat.

"It would give me time to get him ready," Mike said. "He can already fight, so getting him onto the security detail at Stark Industries seems like the obvious choice. Mom can start working with him at the targeting range, too. And before he retires again Jarvis could put in a good word, help him get a prime assignment with-"

"I don't want Jarvis to hand me the job," Harrison interrupted. "I want to _earn_ it."

"You'll have to," Peggy said flatly. "Whether I recommend you to him or not, he'll want to make certain you're ready himself. And he's military trained, so there'll be no faking it. You'll have to work hard."

"That's what I want to do," Harrison said firmly. He shot a questioning look at his mother, who nodded slowly.

"You'll have to keep your grades up while you train," she said.

"I can do that," he promised, and the expression of disbelieving joy that crossed his face was priceless; he clearly hadn't expected his parents to agree to this without a fight.

Peggy looked at Steve. "Tony's your friend, your responsibility. Are you comfortable with this?"

Steve nodded, smiling slightly. From his earliest years Harrison had shown a readiness to throw himself into any task, no matter how challenging, and keep at it with a will until he succeeded. He had a single-mindedness that reminded Steve more than a little of his own. He would do fine.

"That settles that, then. And now we have one more decision to make," Peggy said, and she leaned forward to open a briefcase that was sitting on the coffee table, revealing a thick stack of papers and a bundle of floppy disks inside.

"What's all that?" Natty asked curiously.

"Howard's notes on his serum research," Peggy explained. "Jarvis found it in his most secure hide-away, at a different Stark property. Howard had the sense not to store it with the serum itself. It's all here: the instructions on how to make it from scratch."

"What are we going to do with it?" Tien asked.

Steve stood up and picked up a sheaf of papers, rifling through them with his thumb thoughtfully. "Technically, it belongs to Tony. He inherited everything of Howard's. The company, the inventions, the patents. All of it."

"But you're not going to give it to him," Sarah guessed.

Steve nodded, setting down the pages and rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger briefly. "The trouble is that Tony isn't ready to run the company on his own, and won't be for years. We wouldn't really be giving the serum to him. We would be giving it to Obadiah Stane, and I think it goes without saying that he can't be trusted with something like this."

"I think we can all agree on that," Peggy said.

"What, then?" Maggie asked. "Lock it away somewhere?"

"Howard wanted this research to be used to save lives," Steve pointed out. "Not sit in a safe somewhere moldering in the dust. And I think Tony — at least, the Tony I knew, the Tony to come — would have wanted that, too. Right now, I think we're the only ones in a position to put it to its intended use."

Dave nodded readily. "We know now that Sarah's healing technique works." Tien reached out and squeezed Sarah's hand with a grateful smile as he continued: "With Howard's research, we could finally start mass-producing serum. Start healing people for all kinds of things. Maybe focus on last-chance cases who couldn't get results with traditional medicine."

Sarah's eyes lit up with eagerness. "We've talked so many times about what we would do if we got this far. Quit our jobs, start up our own medical practice. I think it might be time."

"Just a few weeks ago you were horrified at the thought of moving to New York if I applied for that other job," Dave objected with a hint of amusement.

"Who said anything about moving?" Sarah asked him. "We're not going to uproot the whole family. There's no need. We'll just expand the lab out back for the manufacturing side of things, and open up a clinic somewhere in the city for the public to see us for treatment."

"How on earth are you going to advertise, sis?" Mike demanded with a teasing grin. "Come see us, we'll use a magic spell and a non-FDA approved substance to cure your heart disease!"

Sarah looked totally undeterred. "We'll work something out," she said placidly.

"It's a good plan. I think the Starks would have liked it," Steve said with a small smile.

"Wait a minute," Harrison said suddenly. "I thought Tony knew about his dad's serum. Won't he wonder what happened to it?"

Steve opened his mouth, but Natty answered before he could: "Tony knew his dad was _trying_ to replicate the serum. He didn't know whether Howard succeeded. He was only guessing."

"I can have Jarvis tell him something," Peggy said. "That the research hit a dead-end, perhaps, and that Howard gave up on it. Even setting aside the problem with Obadiah Stane, I don't think Tony would have done much with it himself in any case. He's more interested in mechanics than biochemistry, and we know his feelings on the subject of the serum in general, and Captain America in particular."

Steve felt a pulse of sadness at her words. Natty had told them about Tony's last fight with Howard, and the revelation that Tony had overheard Peggy's conversation with Howard about the serum. No wonder Tony had disliked him from the first moment they had met on their first mission for S.H.I.E.L.D.: Steve had been a living reminder to Tony of his father's disappointment in him, not to mention the terrible way they had parted for the last time. The deck had been stacked against the two of them from the beginning. In fact, it was something of a miracle that they had been able to form as much of a friendship as they did, considering the circumstances. Tony had been more forgiving than he had known.

"Hey, Mom," Bram said, leaning forward with a strange gleam in his eyes. "Now that you're finally getting started, I know what your superhero name should be."

"I am _not_ a superhero," Sarah contradicted firmly. "I'll leave that to the more pugilistic members of the family, thank you very much. I'm just a doctor."

"Yeah, you're a doctor," Bram agreed readily. "And you do magic. You know what that makes you?" He paused for dramatic effect. "The Witch Doctor."

"I am _not_ a witch doctor!" Sarah objected loudly over the howls of laughter from everyone else in the room. She had to wait for everyone to settle down before she continued with a hint of indignation, "and besides, that's totally inappropriate for what your father and I already decided to name our clinic."

"I don't know, hon," Dave said, wiping the tears of laughter from his eyes. "We might have to change the clinic name to match now. That one's too good to go to waste."

"What were you going to name it?" Steve asked curiously.

Sarah cleared her throat, and instinctively they all grew more serious. "We're going to call it St. Raphael's," she said.

"The angel from the New Testament?" Steven asked from where he sat by his mother.

Peggy recognized it, too. "The one who stirred the waters of Bethesda."

"-and the first person to go into the pool afterward would be healed," Steven finished with a smile. "That's good, Mom. I like it."

"We thought it was appropriate," Sarah said, exchanging glances with Dave. "Especially since we developed everything right here in Bethesda. Just... a different Bethesda."

"Speaking of names, you know what we need?" Harrison said in a musing tone. "Now that we're all in this together? A team name."

"You mean like the 'Captain America Club?'" Natty said pointedly.

"That's our secret-society name," Harrison said dismissively. "Now we're a response team, too. We need something a little jazzier for that."

"Like what? The Avengers?" Bram asked with a snort.

"Already taken," Maggie said with mock regret.

"How about Captain America and his Howling Progeny?" Harrison asked.

Bram blew a loud raspberry.

"The Steve Rogers Gang," Steven quipped, getting into the spirit of it.

"The Peggy Carter Gang, more like it," Maggie said. "There isn't a single person in this room with the last name of Rogers... not even Grandpa! Technically."

"Technically, only half of us are Carters," Bram said. "If you want to be accurate, we're going to have to hyphenate. The Carter-Capecci Gang."

"Ugh," Natty said with feeling. "I think we need to be a bit more undercover, guys. Something subtle that only our family understands."

"Well, we have plenty of time to figure out something good," Harrison said, undeterred.

"It's settled then," Peggy said, shutting the briefcase and handing it to Sarah. "Guard it well. Make good use of it. I know you'll make it worth the price that was paid."

"We will," Dave and Sarah said together, expressions serious.

Peggy nodded. "And now if you don't mind, Sarah, your father and I could use a lift to England."

"We're house-hunting," Steve explained. "I've been promising my sweetheart an English cottage with a rose garden for a long time now." He smiled at her tenderly. "It's about time I made good on it."

"Are you well enough for that, Mom?" Sarah asked with a touch of concern as she handed Howard's briefcase to Dave and stood up to fish the sling ring out of her jeans pocket.

"Whether I am or not, we put our house on the market today and we need to get our new home sorted out. It'll be nice not to have to sit on a seven-hour flight to get there," Peggy reassured her. "And if I get tired or my head starts to hurt, you can always get me back home in a trice."

"This is gonna be pretty convenient," Steve said, nodding toward the sling ring. "I used to think it would be a little sad and lonely, living across the ocean from all of you, but now we'll always be a portal away."

"Where to?" Sarah asked as she slid the sling ring on her fingers.

"My parents' home in Winchester," Peggy said promptly. "You have the visualization, of course, and we're hoping to find something near them, anyway. That private little corner of their yard amongst the myrtle should do nicely."

Everyone stood up and gave Steve and Peggy a flurry of hugs, and then Dave closed the curtains so that Sarah could make the portal and send them on their way. Steven watched wide-eyed; he had never seen a portal before, other than on the pages of a comic book.

When they were gone, Sarah cast a sideways look at Mike. "How about you? Should I be speeding you on your way home, too?"

"We'll go home the usual way, since the car's already parked outside," Mike said with a grin, giving his sister a big bear hug.

"Mom, can I go with them?" Maggie asked swiftly. "I want to hang out with Natty."

"Me too," Bram said. "Harrison wants to show me Duke Nukem."

"You'll have to fight Sammy for the privilege," Tien said, pulling on her jacket. "She's probably rotting her brains out sitting in front of the computer right now."

"Sammy? Not Clint?" Dave asked in some surprise.

"She fell in love with that computer even faster than Clint did," Mike said. "And not just the games. She had the operating manual memorized in days, and now she's doing things on Mac OS I didn't even know were possible."

"Huh," Dave said with interest. "Okay, Bram and Maggie, grab your coats and I'll drive you over. What about Joe and Amanda, hon? I could pick them up from Patty's house as I drive past and bring them along, too."

"Sounds good," Sarah said.

"Okay." Dave leaned over and kissed Sarah. "How about you, Steven? You coming too?"

"No, I wanna stay with Mom." Sarah could practically see the questions overflowing in her son's eyes, and she knew he would want to pick her brain the moment the two of them could talk without interruption.

After a few minutes of chaos searching for shoes and coats, everyone spilled out of the house and piled into the cars, Mike driving his rental car slowly on the snowy road and Dave following behind in their minivan. Sarah and Steven were left alone in a suddenly-quiet house.

"So what do you think of all this?" Sarah asked, smoothing his hair.

"All the other kids are helping, aren't they?" Steven asked. "Do I get to help too?"

"Mmm-hmm. What do you want to do?" she asked. "Bram helps me and Dad in the lab, and he's learning to use a sling ring, too. We could see if the Masters of the Mystic Arts will give us another one for you to try. Or you can take lessons in hand combat from Uncle Mike, along with Harrison, or learn about espionage like Natty just did. Let's see, what else? Maggie helps me keep the house running and the little kids taken care of. Maybe that doesn't sound very exciting, but it makes her happy, and it helps the family every bit as much as what the other kids do. Or you could come up with something else to contribute, something all your own idea. What are you interested in?"

"It _all_ sounds interesting," Steven admitted.

"Well, you don't have to decide now," Sarah reassured him. "Try a little of everything, see how you like it. What do you want to start with?"

He thought for a long moment before answering. "Fighting might be cool, I guess, but I don't really love the idea of beating people up. Can I try helping in the lab first?"

"Absolutely." She flashed him a smile. "I'll tell you what. You go out to the lab right now and get the computer booted up for me. I'm going to run downstairs and get the lab coats out of the dryer. That'll make it official. And then I'll bring out Howard's notes and we can start going through his list of materials. You can help me inventory what we already have, and what we need to get to make the serum."

Excitement filled his eyes. "Okay!" He turned and started to open the back door.

"Hey, kiddo. You need the code," she reminded him.

"Oh, right."

She told him the code, and then he jogged out into the snow while she ran downstairs and got the lab coats. Stuffing them under her arm, she grabbed Howard's briefcase and followed Steven out to the lab. The door had already shut behind him, so she typed in the code again and entered the lab, grateful for the rush of warm air after the chill of the backyard. And then, at the threshold, she froze just as the door banged shut behind her.

There were men in the lab.

Men she didn't know, five of them. One of them was into the cooler where the completed serum was kept, vials clinking as he rooted through them. One of them was going through her computer files while another dug carelessly through the boxes of supplies under the lab counters, scattering gloves and syringes and biobags across the floor.

And one of them was holding Steven against his chest, gripping her son's shoulder tightly, pressing the barrel of a handgun against the side of his head.

Sarah locked eyes with her son. He was speechless with terror, blue eyes wide and glistening with barely-suppressed tears.

Instantly, every muscle tensed as an indescribable sensation swept over her entire body. Her heart suddenly raced, every pulse point throbbing with warmth, mind focusing with a sharpness she had never before experienced. Every cell of her body seemed poised to do... something. What, she didn't know yet.

"Don't move. Don't make a sound," the man holding Steven warned her. One of the other men brushed past him and began to roughly search Sarah. Numbly, she let him, knowing instinctively that whatever happened, she must not startle any of them, not while they had Steven at gunpoint. Not finding any weapons on her, the man next tried to pull Howard Stark's briefcase out of her hand. Instinctively she tightened her grip on the handle, but he leaned close to her and said in a low voice: "I don't need to tell you what will happen if you don't cooperate." He looked meaningfully at her son, and Sarah slowly let go of the briefcase. The man carried it to the counter, opened it and began to rifle through the pages inside.

A fifth man, who had been silently surveying the work of the others with his hands on his hips, strolled over to her. He was a little shorter than her, well-muscled, wearing only a black T-shirt under his bulletproof vest despite the winter weather. He had guns strapped to both thighs and several day's growth on his chin.

"Hello, Dr. Capecci," he said casually. He held up a blue vial and waggled it between his thumb and finger, watching the serum inside slosh back and forth. "This isn't what I think it is, is it? It is, right? You know, you really shouldn't leave something like this just sitting around." He was using the same condescending tone some adults used toward children, a tone Sarah had learned to hate at a very young age, and instantly she could feel a thin thread of anger coloring her fear.

"My name is Frank Rumlow," he continued, "and guess what, doctor? I'm gonna be your new supervisor."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note:** I welcome feedback!_


	25. Chapter 25

_**Author's note:** Thanks to SpanishGirl, Guest, Nimrodel 101, girliemom, MagicLia16, GuiltyPleasure82, sofiarose613, Cariana, jerseydanielgibson and Apex 85 for your reviews, and all my other readers for your interest._

_A quick response to the Guest reviewer who asked about whether Howard would remember meeting adult Tony back in 1970: I pondered that as I was writing the scene when Howard sees the photo of Tony from 2012, and came to the conclusion that Howard would probably not remember him well enough to instantly draw a connection. While that 1970 meeting was obviously very meaningful and memorable to Tony, Howard was not aware he was meeting anyone other than a visitor to S.H.I.E.L.D. who was a fan of his work and, as Jarvis points out, he "meets a lot of people." Twenty years later, I'm not sure the face of one person from a chance meeting would stick in his memory. (I _have_ had Steve remember a few chance meetings with his own grandkids in the future, but the only reason that works is because he has a serum-enhanced memory and, unlike Howard, he's aware that time shenanigans are possible.) I hope that answers your question. It would have been interesting to have Howard remember Tony, but I ultimately decided it wouldn't be realistic._

_Also, I've had several readers now ask me for a family tree to help keep all the grandkids straight. Here it is, along with their ages and namesakes._

* * *

_The children of **Sarah** (age 44, named after Steve's mother) and **Dave**:_

_Abraham (**Bram**), age 18, named after Dr. Erskine_

_Margaret (**Maggie**), 16, named after Peggy_

_**Steven**, almost 13, named after Steve_

_**Amanda**, 11, named after Peggy's mother_

_Joseph (**Joe**), 9, named after Steve's father_

* * *

_The children of **Mike** (age 44, named after Peggy's brother) and **Tien**:_

_Natasha (**Natty**), 17, named after Natasha Romanoff_

_**Harrison**, 15, named after Peggy's father_

_Samantha (**Sammy**), 12, named after Sam Wilson (she was born the same year as him)_

_**Clint**, 10, named after Clint Barton_

* * *

**December 26, 1991**

"My name is Frank Rumlow," the man in the bulletproof vest said, "and I'll be your new supervisor."

His dark eyes scrutinized Sarah with a hint of a smirk. Behind him, another man wearing a dark knit cap held Steven tightly in his grip, pressing the barrel of a gun against her son's head. Steven was speechless with terror, blue eyes wide and glistening with barely-suppressed tears.

"Rumlow?" Sarah breathed the name out slowly, her voice not coming out as much more than a whisper, eyes darting back and forth between him and Steven. Not _that_ Rumlow, surely. But it couldn't be a coincidence, the name. Which meant that these men were almost certainly...

"Wondering how we found you, doctor?" Rumlow continued, eyebrows arching. "Well, it's a crazy thing, actually. You see, my colleague Brian Moran wears a tracker at all times. He was in charge of a very important asset for us, as I think you already know, and the bosses, they ordered me to keep an eye on him. Wouldn't want to lose track of a guy who can control a weapon that dangerous." He took a step closer to Sarah as he continued: "So imagine my surprise when his tracker showed that on December 16, right in the middle of a mission, he suddenly jumped from Long Island, New York to Bethesda, Maryland. Nearly 300 miles traveled in the blink of an eye. Ended up right here, smack in the middle of the suburbs."

A sudden horror jolted through Sarah as she remembered: Brian Moran. The Hydra agent who had come through the portal with them when she'd rescued Mike and Tien. The one who had taken poison in her backyard after his escape attempt failed. They'd kept his body right here in the lab until...

"And it gets even weirder," Rumlow continued blithely. "About an hour later, he makes another wild jump, this time to the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Not an island. Nowhere near a shipping lane. And then the tracker malfunctioned. I guess he drowned." His stare bored into her. "Or maybe you killed him first and then dumped the body. Now, moving someone across that big of a distance in that short a time... that's a pretty good trick." He studied her intensely. "I can't wait to see how you pulled it off."

A radio at his belt suddenly crackled to life, and a man's voice said: "House is secured."

Rumlow lifted the radio to his mouth without taking his eyes off Sarah. "You've got Director Carter and her husband?" he asked.

"Negative. No trace of them. We searched every floor."

Rumlow raised his eyebrows at Sarah in a wordless challenge. "Let me guess. You moved them somewhere in the blink of an eye?"

She held her tongue. They already knew her name and that her mother was involved, which was disastrous in ways she couldn't even begin to fathom, and she knew instinctively that the more she talked, the worse it would be. But she could not stop her eyes from darting back over to Steven, held in the other man's grip. He looked as terrified as she felt, visibly shaking although he had his teeth clamped shut; she could see the muscles in his jaw clenching from here. His eyes were silently pleading to her for help. But what could she do? They might hurt him before she got him away from them.

And at the thought of it, at the picture that suddenly flashed through her imagination, something inside her went cold. Some part of her that she didn't know _could_ grow cold.

"Hey, Rumlow," one of the other men said then, holding up the papers from Howard Stark's briefcase with a victorious grin. "It's Stark's notes. On the serum. They're all here. We got 'em!"

Rumlow smiled broadly, and his shoulders visibly relaxed. The other men ransacking the lab paused to exchange triumphant looks with each other. She could only imagine what kind of reward they had been offered for the successful completion of this mission. A promotion, at the very least. Maybe even a chance to use the serum themselves.

"Well, what do you know?" Rumlow said to Sarah with a grin. "And here we thought you and your merry little band were providing Stark with extra security... but it looks like you were just our rivals, hunting for the same prize."

"I'm no thief," she snapped before she could stop herself.

"Oh, you're a thief all right, just a lousy one," he said with amusement. "But I'll tell you what. I'll let you keep Stark's notes. Let you continue his work. Your husband, too; a geneticist at George Washington, right? Very impressive resume. Between the two of you I bet you can churn out batches for us pretty quick. And in return..." Rumlow turned toward the man holding Steven. "I'll let you have your kid back."

"Which one is this?" he asked then with casual curiosity, moving toward Steven. "Abraham? Joseph?"

"Steven," the man holding her son answered readily. "The middle one."

Rumlow laughed a little, glancing back at Sarah. "I don't know how you keep them all straight, doctor. But don't worry. I'll help you keep an eye on him, and the other four, too. I'm a dad myself, you know." He bent down to look Steven in the eye, hands resting on his knees. "We've been watching you for a while, you know," he said to Steven softly. "We know where you go to school. Where you go to church. Who all your friends in the neighborhood are."

Rumlow reached out to slowly smooth Steven's ruffled hair back down. Steven leaned back, trying to move out of his reach, but the other man held him in a vice-like grip against his chest, and Steven was forced to tolerate Rumlow's touch.

"Yeah..." Rumlow said, trailing one finger down the side of Steven's face. "I think we're all going to get along _real_ well." Steven bit his lip hard and managed to bite back a sob, but could not stop two tears from suddenly flooding down his cheeks.

It was at that moment that something else flared into life deep down inside Sarah. Something hot. Something that threatened to bubble to the surface and choke the very life out of the men who were daring to touch her son.

"See, this is the problem with letting women raise boys," Rumlow said, his lips curling with disgust as he looked down at Steven's tears. "I brought _my_ boy up right. _He_ learned not to snivel every time someone shook him by the collar. _He_ learned how to take it like a man."

"I'm well aware of what you did to your son," Sarah said sharply. "And if you do it to mine..." She gritted her teeth, an anger unlike she had ever felt before surging in her veins. She forced herself to take a deep breath to keep her voice steady.

"You know," she said a little more quietly, "I became a doctor because I wanted to help people. Not hurt them. But if you don't let him go? _This instant?_" She paused, her eyes boring into Rumlow's. "I'll tear you apart."

Rumlow barked out a laugh. "Okay, sweetheart."

Behind him, the three other men were packing up her computer, her notes, Howard's notes, all the samples of serum, everything, but she couldn't even bring herself to care right now. It felt like she was looking through a tunnel, and all she could see at the end was Steven and Rumlow. She knew she shouldn't talk, but she couldn't seem to stop herself.

"You'll wish it was my brother and not me," she hissed between her teeth. "He knows how to do it quick and painless. I _don't_."

Rumlow's eyes grew suddenly eager. "Your brother? What about him?"

"And if any of you are still alive in the next five minutes?" she barreled on, enunciating every word clearly so they would be sure to understand her. "You can give my regards to Alexander Pierce."

All the men in the room stopped what they were doing and turned to stare at her.

"What did you say?" Rumlow said, face going slack with surprise.

"Tell him he's already a dead man," she added harshly. "He just doesn't know it yet."

The man holding Steven exchanged alarmed looks with Rumlow, and then he stopped doing the only thing that was keeping him alive, and he took the gun from Steven's head and pointed it at hers instead.

"How do you know that name?" he demanded.

She only smiled.

"Hey!" the man barked angrily, waggling the gun at her. "You better start talking, or I start breaking fingers!" He gave Steven's shoulder a rough shake.

"He isn't as breakable as you think," Sarah said. She paused. "And neither am I."

And then she charged toward him.

He instinctively pulled the trigger, as she'd known he would, but the hyper-focus she'd gone into allowed her to see his finger squeezing in slow-motion, and with whip-fast reflexes she twisted to the side, feeling only a sharp sting in her shoulder that didn't slow her down in the slightest before she crashed into him.

The man shoved Steven away an instant before they collided in a vain attempt to free his arms to block her tackle, but he clearly wasn't prepared for how much momentum she was able to build up in just a few steps, and she knocked him backwards full-force, body-slamming him against the lab cupboards. An involuntary grunt escaped his wide-open mouth, and then he slid down the cupboards and onto the floor, insensible, the gunshot still echoing around the room.

"Don't shoot!" Rumlow yelled out urgently as the other men all whipped out their guns. "We need her alive!"

"Steven, _run_!" Sarah shouted, seeing him crouching down on the floor, looking stunned at what had just happened. "Get out of here!"

He scrambled for the door obediently, but she didn't get to see him leave, because another man was already swinging a fist toward her head.

She caught his fist, stopping it cold. He tried to pull away from her grasp, but she wouldn't let him. Instead, she grabbed his wrist with her other hand, twisted to the side, and flung him over her shoulder with all of her strength.

He came down hard, his body smashing down onto the lab counter back-first, cracking the stone top in half as he tumbled down into the splintering wood of the cupboards underneath. Sawdust flew up into the air, obscuring the shocked faces of the three men who still remained. One of them swore loudly, backing away from her, but then his eye fell on one of the lab stools, and he grabbed it and threw it at her instead. Instinctively she reached out and caught it only inches before its metal bars hit her head.

She glared at the man who had thrown it, and then threw the stool back at him. He ducked behind the counter and managed to avoid it before it smashed into the wall behind him and plaster exploded into the air, but without hesitation she leapt over the counter and started to give him what he deserved fist-first.

Her attack was artless, frenzied, and in the heat of the moment she had only the vaguest idea of what she was doing and how she was doing it, but she was faster and stronger and angrier than him, and he had little defense against it. Within seconds she had him down, too.

Three down, two to go. She came around the end of the counter, breathing quickly but feeling ready for more. Rumlow was at the end of the room by the door, his gun trained on her, looking at her in amazement. She could feel the warm flow of blood from the bullet wound in her shoulder, soaking her sleeve, but she barely felt the pain.

"You took it yourself?" he asked in disbelief, eyes flicking over to the vials of serum the other men had abandoned amid the fight. "You _took_ it?"

"You couldn't be more wrong," Sarah said, and she lifted her chin proudly. "I'm my father's daughter."

The other man, who had been standing between her and Rumlow, suddenly launched himself toward her. She grappled with him in a fierce but brief struggle, and as she did so she could see Rumlow snatching up Howard Stark's briefcase and running out the door and into the snowy yard. A fresh surge of adrenaline shot through her as she realized she didn't know where Steven was anymore, and for all she knew Rumlow was running toward him. She kicked the other man where it hurt the most and, not waiting to see if he stayed down, she dashed out into the snow too.

The sun had just slipped below the horizon, but in the twilight she could see several men bursting out of the back door of her home just as Rumlow disappeared inside, briefcase in hand.

She ran after Rumlow full-speed, clipping first one man and then another with her shoulder as she ran past, sending them tumbling to the ground. The third one made a strange flicking motion with his wrist just before she could reach him, and abruptly she went down and hit the snow hard, something entangling her feet.

He fell upon her, delivering brutal blows, and precious time ticked away as she tried to protect her face with her arms while she worked clumsily to wriggle her feet out of the tight restraints. Finally, seeing the futility of it, she bent her knees up against her chest and double-kicked him in the face instead. He fell back, unconscious, and she reached down and snapped the cord with both hands, freeing her feet at last. Shedding powdery snow, she scrambled back up, punched out the first two men who had staggered back up to fight her again, and ran inside the house.

A strong draft was blowing through, which meant the front door was open, too. Without hesitation she dashed straight through the house and out the front door. In the dim light she could see Rumlow running across the front yard, briefcase in one hand and dragging Steven by the hair with the other. He was almost to a car parked on the street that she didn't recognize.

There was no time to catch up to him, so she did the only thing she could: she shoved her hand into her pocket, pulled out the sling ring, and in one quick swish of her hand she opened up a portal between Rumlow and his getaway car.

He skidded to a stop in the slippery snow just before he reached the edge of the portal. Inside the circle of spinning light was nothing but empty air. Frigid air blasted through the opening, even colder than the air here, and far below the opening lightning was spidering its way across a floor of storm-gray clouds. Clutching both Steven and the briefcase, Rumlow stared through the portal in shock.

Sarah walked toward him slowly, both hands up to keep the portal stable, the wind whipping her hair wildly around her face.

"The Atlantic Ocean," she explained to Rumlow matter-of-factly. "It's a long way down to the water. I got the visualization from looking out the window of a plane."

"_Witch_," he hissed through his teeth, looking back at her in naked revulsion.

"You said it. Now let go of my son," she said darkly, "and throw that briefcase to me."

Rumlow laughed humorlessly. "No, that ain't the way it works," he said contemptuously. "The kid and the case, that's what keeping you from doing to _me_ what you did to Brian Moran." He raised his voice in a commanding tone. "So you're gonna turn that thing off and you're gonna let me go, or else I'm gonna throw him in." He tightened the fist he was using to hold Steven by the hair, making him cry out sharply, and pulled him closer to the portal.

Sarah felt her brows come together. There was a dangerous pause.

"Steven," she said in a voice low but clear. "Take the case from him, and run."

"Mom-!" he said breathlessly, eyes wide with fear.

She looked into his eyes steadily. "You can do this. You can."

His chest rising and falling quickly, Steven looked back and forth between her and Rumlow. And then, slowly, his brows knit together and his jaw clenched, his expression growing uncharacteristically fierce.

He reached out and grabbed the briefcase with both hands, pulling it firmly toward himself. Rumlow, still clutching it by the handle, pulled back and seemed surprised at the amount of resistance he encountered. He tried to brace his feet in the slippery snow, but Steven pulled on the case harder and Rumlow slid forward helplessly several inches. He yanked on Steven's hair in an effort to make him let go, but he stubbornly held on.

A flash of anger crossed Rumlow's face, and abruptly he let go of Steven's hair and raised his fist threateningly. Steven stared up at him unwaveringly, lips pressed together and brow fiercely furrowed, both arms clamped around the briefcase.

The fist came down on his face like a hammer. Steven crumpled in a heap down in the snow... still clutching the briefcase. The hinge had snapped, leaving Rumlow staggering back holding the empty handle. Steven scrambled desperately backward in the snow, cradling the briefcase against his body.

Rumlow looked up just in time to see Sarah kick him solidly in the chest.

He stumbled backward through the portal and plummeted through the empty air, arms pinwheeling, shouting uselessly against the frigid wind. His body rapidly dwindled to a small dark dot against the storm-lashed waves far below.

With one quick flourish, Sarah closed the portal, and the wind abruptly stopped. Instantly, she ran over to Steven and fell to her knees in the snow. He was sitting up slowly, looking stunned but okay, both arms still wrapped around the briefcase.

They didn't say a word, just threw their arms around each other with the briefcase sandwiched in between them, panting for breath in the silence of the night, not caring that they were getting cold and wet in the snow. Sarah had never been so thankful in her life to feel the warmth of Steven's body against hers, not since the day he'd been born and it had taken the doctors what had seemed like an eternity to get him to breathe properly before they would finally let her hold him. She squeezed him tightly, and his answering grip on her was every bit as tight.

They might have stayed that way for a long time, just being grateful they were both still alive, if Sarah hadn't slowly lifted her head with a frown pulling down her mouth: was that a siren she heard in the distance, and coming closer? Suddenly alert again, she looked around, belatedly remembering that there had been a gunshot back in the lab; she was only just now starting to register the sting of the wound in her shoulder. The blood spotting the snow around them was her own.

No emergency vehicles were in sight, at least not yet, but Sarah's eye was drawn to the window of the house next to theirs, lit up with a string of Christmas lights. Her elderly neighbor was pulling his curtains to the side to look out, and he was clutching his phone to his ear, speaking into it urgently. Horrified, Sarah looked at the other houses around them.

They all had scared faces looking out the windows at her and Steven.

* * *

"We can't go back home."

Steve leaned forward and patted his daughter's knee in silent sympathy. Sarah was sitting on the couch in the safe house, eyes distant. Dave had his arm around her, carefully avoiding her bandaged shoulder. Steven was on her other side, leaned up against his mother in silence, just like he had been ever since they'd all arrived. Peggy was sitting on the other couch with Mike and Tien. All the grandkids were spread around on the floor in their sleeping bags, but no one was remotely thinking of sleep. In the next room, all the serum samples and the lab equipment, along with Howard Stark's briefcase, had been piled on the kitchen table.

"Hydra knows where we live," Sarah continued dully. "Where we work. Where the kids go to school. We can't ever go back." She sighed deeply. "Fifteen years. We've been there 15 years. All our friends..." She trailed off, looking stricken. "Will we even be able to say goodbye to them?" Dave squeezed her shoulders, but didn't say anything. What was there to say? She was right, and they all knew it.

"You're sure your neighbors saw what happened?" Mike repeated in deep concern. "They saw you were attacked?"

"They heard the gunshot and called the police. They saw the fight, they saw how it ended," Sarah said in deep distress. "My friend Patty. The Greens. Mr. Graham. All of them. I can only imagine..." She closed her eyes tightly and shook her head. "I can only imagine what they must be thinking right now. What they must be telling the police."

"I called Nick Fury personally and had him secure the scene at your house," Peggy said quietly. "I asked him to send away the local law enforcement, and to use only his most trusted agents to guard the property. He'll be able to bury the reports. He'll think of something to tell your neighbors. He's good at that."

"You're _sure_ you got everything out of the lab before the police arrived?" Dave asked anxiously.

Sarah nodded wearily. "I sent everything here. And I moved the... the Hydra agents, too, before Steven and I left. I don't think the police ever saw us."

"I think what we need to do next, sis, is to use your, uh, _resources_ to empty out your house overnight," Mike said, smoothly taking up the thread. "Maybe you can get Mahika and some of the other Masters to help us. Then we'll clear out Mom and Dad's house — that shouldn't take too long, since they already had it staged for buyers — and then ours."

"_Our _house too?" a startled Natty asked from where she sat in her sleeping bag, her knees drawn up against her chest. The deep concern etched into her face was mirrored by her siblings.

"They were watching Dave and Sarah's house for more than a week, honey," Mike explained gently. "They saw all of us coming and going, and they knew Director Carter was involved. It's only a matter of time before they send another team to track down the rest of us."

"They only zeroed in on Sarah and Dave's house because that's where Moran went," Peggy said. "Once they saw there was a secure building on the property behind the house, they must have realized something valuable was being stored there. They were smart enough to watch and wait and make a plan. Don't blame yourself, Sarah. There was no way you could have foreseen this."

"Do you think they knew...?" Maggie started, and then shot a knowing look at Steve. She knew better than to say more in front of the younger kids. They were scared enough as it was, and this wasn't the time to go into all the family's secrets.

"No," Sarah said briefly. "They obviously weren't prepared for... for what they found."

"Still," Mike said, "we're a danger to them, and they know it. Our association with Mom alone would be enough to convince them of that."

"Where can we go?" Bram asked faintly. His little brother Joe was curled up against him in his own sleeping bag, fiercely concentrating on the Transformer in his hands. He didn't seem to be paying attention, but Steve was sure he was. "Where won't they think to look for us?"

"Out of the country would be best," Mike said matter-of-factly.

"We have to leave the _country_?" Amanda blurted out. "Mom! I don't wanna move! I wanna stay here!" Her little brother Joe didn't take his eyes off his Transformer as he methodically folded and unfolded it and then folded it again, but the corners of his mouth curved down and he started blinking rapidly.

"I know, honey," Dave quickly soothed her before Sarah could. "I know. None of us do. But we have to keep all of you kids safe, and the research we got from Howard Stark is really, really important. We're going to use it to save a lot of people's lives, and we can do that anywhere in the world. The important thing is to keep it far away from those men that attacked Mom and Steven. They wouldn't use it the way we would."

"Why can't we fight them?" Amanda demanded fiercely, sitting stock upright in her sleeping bag, fists clenched. "Why can't we fight them _all_?"

It took a long time to get her to understand somewhat and to calm down, and even though Amanda did most of the talking — and storming — as usual, it was clear that the other little ones who didn't fully know what was at stake were just as upset as she was at having their world suddenly turned upside down. Sammy asked a few questions of her own in a faintly trembling voice, while by her side, her brother Clint went sullen and quiet. Finally, the conversation began to peter out and the kids laid down in their sleeping bags to try to sleep.

The adults moved into the kitchen to continue their conversation without disturbing the children, and young Steven followed them and sat down at the table too, although he hadn't spoken up once all night and had that distant look in his eye he often got that made it clear he wasn't exactly on the same planet as the rest of them right now.

"Steven?" Peggy asked him gently, laying a hand on top of his after she had brought a steaming teapot to the table and Tien had taken it from her to pour for everyone. "Are you all right?"

Steven stirred slightly. "Yeah," he said softly after a beat. "I just... need to think."

He immediately fell silent again, and Peggy looked at him with concern for a long moment before turning back to Sarah and Dave.

"You should come to England with your father and I," she said. "I have contacts who could help you jump through the hoops you need to get your clinic established."

Sarah nodded slowly. "I've been thinking about that, too. The kids have at least been there, and they know it's home for you, Mom; maybe they wouldn't feel too out of place."

Dave nodded, too. "We could get them into a new school and not worry about a language barrier. That would simplify things."

"Your mother told the real estate agent she wanted a small home with a big garden," Steve said, looking at Peggy with a wordless question in his eyes, and she nodded firmly in response. "He told her that would be hard to find. Maybe what we need to get is a big home with a big garden. A house big enough to hold your family, too."

"Oh, Dad, we're not gonna crash your retirement," Sarah said quickly. "You and Mom deserve some peace and quiet."

"Well, we would like _some_ peace and quiet," Peggy said with a wry smile, glancing at Steve. "But perhaps not too much of it. We were both afraid it would be dull and lonely, so far from all of you."

"Mom, we have_ five kids_," Sarah reminded her with a faint laugh. "Peace and quiet is _non-existent_ for our family."

"Bram will be moving out in a matter of months," Dave pointed out dryly. "And Maggie won't be far behind."

"Yes, but they're the quieter ones!" Sarah objected. "And Steven here. I can't make any promises about Amanda or Joe."

"After all these years, you don't think we're used to a little happy chaos?" Peggy asked with a smile.

"As a practical matter," Steve added, "it would be safer for us to be together. It would be pretty difficult for someone to ransack your lab when there's an entire family of you-know-whats living on top of it."

"I'm _not_ going to put the lab anywhere near our home again," Sarah whispered as strenuously as she could without waking any of the children in the next room.

"Not so fast," Mike broke in. "I know you're worried about security, sis, and you're right to be considering what just happened, but putting the lab anywhere else would be a mistake. I can help you make it more secure this time around. Between your family and Mom and Dad, someone will be home almost all the time. And when you aren't, Harrison and I can set up a watch. He needs practice standing guard anyway, to get him ready to work for Stark Industries."

"You're going to move to England, too?" Sarah asked.

Mike looked at Tien, and they both shook their heads. "Maybe Vietnam," Tien said. "We've talked off and on over the years about doing that; I wanted the kids to know my parents better and to learn more about where we came from, but we never could make it work with Mike's job. He needed to be in D.C."

"I still need to be in D.C.," Mike said. "I can't think about quitting now; I have Clint Barton and Maria Hill to think of. It won't be long before they join S.H.I.E.L.D., and I'm not gonna leave them in the hands of Hydra for their training." He scratched his head thoughtfully. "But with the portals, maybe that opens up more possibilities for us. Maybe I _could_ live in Vietnam and still work in D.C. Hydra would find it pretty hard to follow me home that way."

Sarah half-smiled. "Mike, I am _not_ going to shuttle you back and forth to work every day."

"I wasn't suggesting it." Mike shrugged. "Seems like Bram's doing pretty well with his sling ring. Maybe I should talk Natty or Harrison into taking it up, too."

"Why the kids?" Tien asked him blankly.

"Why not?" Mike asked just as blankly. "_I_ don't have the time to tackle something like that. I'm gonna come home from training agents every day only to work with Harrison as soon as I get home."

Tien gave him a funny look. "Well, why can't_ I_ learn how to make portals?"

Mike paused, and then raised his eyebrows. "Well... I can't think of any reason why you couldn't."

"I'm the one who's home all the time, and available to shuttle people around," Tien pointed out.

"That's true."

"I'll talk to Master Mahika," Sarah said with a smile. "If the Masters of the Mystic Arts will give us another sling ring, I'll teach you myself."

At that moment, a fizzing, hissing sound started up, and half of them instinctively jumped to their feet as a portal unexpectedly opened up right behind Sarah. She whirled, one hand instantly digging into her pocket for her own sling ring, but she hadn't even gotten it out yet before Steve reached over and stopped her hand.

A woman was standing in the center of the portal, hand upraised gracefully to sustain it: a bald woman dressed in silver-gray robes and a midnight blue obi.

"Ancient One," Steve said, slowing releasing Sarah's hand. Everyone at the table suddenly went quiet and still.

"Captain. May I come in?" she asked.

"Please."

The Ancient One stepped through the portal, and they all caught a glimpse of a stone courtyard behind her filled with robed men and women before she closed the portal with a practiced gesture. Then she stood in the kitchen, hands clasped behind her, gazing serenely at the seven of them.

They stared back, mesmerized; even young Steven had woken up from his reverie and was looking at her with open fascination. They all knew the stories, of course, but only Steve himself had ever seen her. Still, Peggy was the first to snap out of it and ask her politely: "Would you like some tea?"

"That would be lovely," the Ancient One said with a small smile. As Peggy moved toward the stove, the Ancient One surveyed the rest of them one by one, and when she got to Tien, she reached down into the folds of her obi, produced a sling ring, and silently offered it to her.

"Thank you," Tien said, looking slightly intimidated as she took it, whether by the sling ring or the Ancient One herself, Steve wasn't sure.

"Use it responsibly," the Ancient One said. "Listen to your teacher."

"I will," Tien promised.

The Ancient One nodded in approval. "Well," she said, next looking over Steve with interest. "You look a little different from the last time I saw you."

"You haven't aged a day."

She smiled the smile of a woman who's been told that before. "Thank you," she said with perfect sincerity. Then the she leaned back slightly to look through the doorway into the living room, where the grandchildren were sleeping, and studied at them for a long moment with a cocked head.

"I thought you came back to have a family, Captain," she said in faint amusement, "not start your own tribe."

"This is how the rest of us live forever," he said. "And besides-"

"We like children," Sarah finished readily.

"We like children," Mike agreed.

Peggy handed the Ancient One a cup of tea, and Dave quickly pulled over a chair for her. She sat down, and the rest of them followed suit.

The Ancient One took a sip of tea and her eyes slid shut as she let out a small appreciative sigh. "If you want good tea, go East or ask a Brit," she said with a cadence that suggested she'd said it many times before, and Peggy's lips curved up in acknowledgement of the compliment.

"I came to offer our services," the Ancient One said then, setting the cup down on its saucer carefully. "I understand you need to move your households, and quickly. England and Vietnam, was it? I think we can help with that."

Steve held her eyes for a long moment. "You knew this would happen," he said.

The Ancient One regarded him coolly. "I knew it might."

"You knew I would try to save Howard, and you didn't try to stop me?"

"I knew you would fail," she said calmly. "And so did you. But you saved what most needed to be saved, and that's what matters. I told you before, Captain: I would never have let you come back if I thought you would muddle things." She looked at him a little regretfully. "I'm sorry for the price your family paid. But you've been doing this long enough that I don't think you need me to tell you: the point is not to eliminate suffering. What we _can_ sometimes do is give it meaning. I trust you will find some way to turn this to good."

"We're working on that."

The Ancient One nodded seriously. "Good. As you know, I've dedicated my life to using magic for rather... cosmic pursuits." She looked at Sarah and Dave. "You've chosen to follow a smaller, more intimate calling. But perhaps no less important." She took another sip of tea. "There are sometimes students we train at Kamar-Taj who find they are not suited for the type of work we do at the Sanctums," she continued. "There's no shame in it; it's a hard life. When you're ready, I can put you in touch with them. Perhaps you can help them find meaning by offering to teach your trade."

"I would like that," Sarah said immediately, looking to Dave for confirmation. "_We_ would like that."

The Ancient One stood up. "I'll have my people clear out your houses now. We have ways to speed the process up. It should be done in a few hours, and we can store everything until you have your new homes ready."

She opened a portal, and once again they saw the stone courtyard at Kamar-Taj and the robed Masters of the Mystic Arts waiting there. The Ancient One gestured for Sarah to precede her into the portal. "You need only open a portal to each home once, doctor," she said. "Once the Masters have the visualizations and you've given them their instructions, they can take it from there and you can rest. You've had a difficult day, and you have children to care for."

Sarah stepped into the courtyard, followed by the Ancient One, who glanced back before she closed it.

"Be careful, child," she said soberly, and it took them all a moment to realize she was addressing young Steven directly. "Moderation in all things. Don't forget the difference between goodness and greatness... and which one the world needs most."

The portal snapped shut, and she was gone. Steven blinked owl-like, and then looked at his father questioningly.

"Let's get you to bed now," Dave said, putting his arm around Steven. "We should all go to bed. Tomorrow will be a long day."

They cleared up the tea cups and trickled off to bed, the adults taking the three bedrooms in the safe house and Steven carrying his own sleeping bag to join the other grandkids sleeping in the living room. Before long Sarah returned through a portal. The lights were switched off and the house grew silent, and one by one they drifted off to sleep.

Mike was deep in sleep when he was awoken by a hand gently shaking his shoulder. He opened his eyes and saw Steven standing there by the bed, illuminated by a thin bar of light coming from the hallway.

"Uncle Mike?" he asked softly.

"Yeah?"

The hallway light behind him silvered Steven's outline, leaving his face in shadow. "Will you teach me how to fight?" he whispered.

"Sure, kid," Mike said sleepily. "If your parents say yes. Harrison will be glad to get a new partner to work with."

"Is he good?" Steven asked.

"Harrison? Yeah. Makes his old man proud."

Steven lifted his chin slightly. "Then I'm gonna get as good as him. _Better_."

Mike smiled slightly as Tien slept on beside him. "That's the attitude. Harrison will like that. Natty will be moving out soon, and your brother and sister don't have quite the thirst for fighting that he does. He was worried he would run out of good challenges."

"And once I am, no one will be able to do all that to me again," Steven said under his breath, almost to himself.

Mike was quiet for a moment, knowing what he meant. "Fights are unpredictable, Steven," he said at last. "No one can ever be sure, and overconfidence is dangerous. But I can give you a good shot. If you stick with it, if you really work hard and use what you've got, you could become a handful for even the best fighters in the world."

"That's what I want," Steven whispered.

For some reason, Mike found himself frowning a little. "You sure?"

"Yes," Steven said firmly. "I'm sure."

* * *

**January 31, 1992**

They drove from the London Sanctum to their new home in Winchester, England by caravan: the moving truck in front, followed by Sarah and Dave's family in a minivan, and then Peggy and Steve in their new car with Natty, Sammy and Clint in the backseat, trailed by Mike, Tien and Harrison in a taxi behind them.

It would have been easier to have the Masters of the Mystic Arts move all their things directly into the new house on Merryweather Lane, of course, but they had quickly realized they needed to bring a moving truck to maintain appearances for their new neighbors. Mike and Tien's family had already settled into their new home in Qui Nhon, but had come along to help the rest of them with moving day. With two households worth of things to unload, they would need all the muscle they could get.

The moment Peggy had pulled away from the curb — Steve was only too happy to let her drive today, rather than risk everyone's lives figuring out how to drive on the left side of the road — Natty leaned forward and handed Steve a cassette tape.

"Will you play that, Grandpa?" she asked.

"No!" Sammy and Clint groaned together. Steve looked at the label and realized it was a language instruction tape. It made sense: while all of Mike and Tien's kids had learned some Vietnamese from their mother at home, they weren't fluent enough to be confident in their new schools just yet.

"Quit whining," Natty told her siblings in a good-humored way as Steve popped the tape into the player. "This is making us all grow and learn and stretch. That's a _good_ thing."

And so they listened to vocabulary lessons for the hour and a half it took to get to Winchester, and by the time the car stopped, Steve and Peggy could say "Nhà vệ sinh ở đâu?" right along with the best of them.

"Whoa," Sammy breathed out as they all got out of the car, grateful to stretch their legs again. She gazed up in awe at the house. Peggy and Steve had already seen it, of course, and last week after the paperwork was finalized Sarah and Dave had brought their kids to tour the house and pick out their bedrooms, but this was the first time Mike and Tien's kids were seeing it.

It was a beautiful cottage, two stories high and covered over with ivy, with lots of little gabled windows peering out. The grounds around the building were extensive, and although the wintery gray of the gardens was now broken only by the occasional evergreen bush or tree, when spring came it would be a riot of color, all roses and delphinium and foxglove. Peggy had seen the photos of the gardens in their prime, and had confessed to Steve that she could hardly wait the months it would take to see it in person.

Sarah and Dave's family had spilled out of their minivan, too, and Mike was paying the taxi driver and sending him on his way. For a few minutes there was a lot of excited running around and exploring of the grounds by the kids.

"This is pretty fantastic," Natty said, looking around with a wide smile. She was wearing red lipstick. She didn't used to wear lipstick, Steve realized... until after she had met Tony. It suited her, though. She looked more than a woman than a girl, but then again, that's what she was.

"Don't be jealous," Maggie answered with a smile of her own. As usual, the two of them had been walking around the grounds with their arms linked together, acting more like sisters than cousins. "You guys get to live right by the ocean, and in a nice warm climate. I can't wait to visit _you_. Especially at this time of year." She shivered a little in her coat.

"Isn't this close to the ocean, too?" Natty asked curiously.

"About half an hour's drive," Peggy confirmed. It was one of the things Steve had hoped for; almost everywhere he had lived in his lifetime, whether it was Brooklyn, New Jersey, Bethesda or even the brief period he had hunkered down in Scotland during his time in exile, he had never been far from the sea.

Some of the kids started agitating to go into the house, but first the adults quickly gathered them all together by the flagpole in front of the house, and they had a solemn little ceremony with the flags that not too long ago had been flying over Steve and Peggy's home in Bethesda. This time, though, the Union Jack went on top, and the Stars and Stripes fluttered below it as Steve and Peggy pulled the rope together to lift them up into the breeze. Everyone applauded, looking up as the flags waved in unison in the cold January sky.

"God save the Queen, and God bless America," Peggy said briskly, and they all laughed at the inversion of the phrase they had always said to each other during their sometimes-over-the-top celebrations of the Fourth of July over their years.

Steve leaned over to kiss Peggy. "Welcome home, sweetheart," he said warmly.

"Welcome to Headquarters, you mean," she said after kissing him back. The entire basement of the house had been set aside to be renovated as a lab for Dave and Sarah, and Mike was already making plans to install extensive security measures onto the property with Harrison's help.

"It's been a long time since I lived at Headquarters," Steve said, and then admitted: "I've kinda missed it." He brushed a silver wave of hair back from her face. "You ready for retirement?"

"How much of a retirement will it be?" she asked wryly. "I have my memoirs to write. We have Tony Stark to keep an eye on. All these children to finish raising. And in 20 years-"

"-I'll wake up from the ice."

"And then the Hydra uprising and the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D.," Peggy added, swiftly changing the subject. She didn't like thinking of him in the ice. She never had. "We'll need to get ready for that. Once Project Insight gets off the ground, I suspect it will be rather like with the Pyms and the Starks; our family was probably involved somehow. Helping save what needs to be saved. Quietly."

"We'll all be ready by then," Steven said, breaking into their conversation unexpectedly, expression serious. "We'll all be old enough to help."

"And speaking of which," Harrison said with a spark of eagerness in his eyes, "I finally figured it out!"

When everyone looked at him in a questioning way, he added: "About what to call our response team, remember? I just realized: what we really need is to be named by the master of nicknames. The titan of name-calling himself: Tony Stark."

Bram scoffed. "What, you wanna go explain to him who and what we are, and wait for him to give us a nickname?"

"We don't need to," Harrison said with uncharacteristic seriousness. "He already named us a long time ago. Think about it. The Avengers, they did their best work _after_ the fact, right? After the attacks had already begun. Us, we already know what's coming. We start our fights before the bad guys start theirs. You know what that makes us?"

"What?" Steve asked.

Harrison smiled triumphantly. "The Prevengers."

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note: **I would love to know what you think of this new turn in the story, and where you think it might go next. Let me know in the comments!_


	26. Chapter 26

**_Author's note: _**_I swore to myself I'd pick up the pace on this story now that the Howard Stark arc is over and get through a decade in a single chapter. The result was... a really, really long chapter that I ended up having to cut in half. _**_*facepalm*_**_ So you get six years today instead of ten. :-D_

_A few chapters back I answered a request to say which actors I would cast for my various OCs. I didn't list any for the younger grandkids then because they hadn't fully entered the story yet, but you're about to see more of them. So, here's the rest:_

_In Sarah and Dave's family:_

_Steven: I've always thought of him as strongly resembling Steve, so a young Chris Evans seems appropriate._

_Amanda: Jessica Chastain_

_Joe: John Krasinski_

_In Mike and Tien's family:_

_Sammy: Veronica Ngo_

_Clint: __Le Thai Hoa _

_Also, there will be an updated family tree at the end of the chapter._

_Finally, thanks to kingmanaena, Guests, jerseydanielgibson (yep, "Prevengers" is dorky. But that works well for its purposes, I think. :-D), SJS3000, shivanimishal (new reviewers always welcome! Next chapter will have more Steve and Peggy), Agent-Fangirl27, dissatisfieduser, RealityReflected, Nimrodel 101, Nzie, Screaming Dean, Magic Lia16, Guiltypleasure82, girliemom, SpanishGirl and__ conlonkeith (I love that wibbly-wobbley timey-wimey concept too! But this won't cross over with Doctor Who, as fun as that might be), for your reviews for Chapter 25, and all my other readers for your interest!_

* * *

**May 15, 1992**

It was an hour from sunset, but the May air was growing cooler in Peggy's garden thanks to the cloud cover that had just rolled in, as it so often did here in Winchester. Steve was glad he'd put on a sweater before coming out; as much as he hated to admit it, he was starting to get chilled more easily than he used to, and the air here tended to be damp. Well, he couldn't run from old age forever. And he wouldn't want to; retirement had its advantages. After more than four months in the English countryside, he was already beginning to look back at the hustle and bustle of their years in Bethesda as a distant memory.

Holding a pair of scissors in his hands, he strolled toward the white picket fence where a showy bloom of pink peonies grew, and with a low groan, he bent down to snip off some of the stalks to make a bouquet for the kitchen table. The peonies wouldn't last long, and Peggy wanted to enjoy them while she could.

A feminine laugh pealed through the air from another part of the garden as he straightened up carefully; Maggie, it sounded like. She loved gardening as much as Peggy did, and was only too happy to do the tending that Peggy couldn't. Maggie rarely worked alone, though; the couple who owned the sprawling cottage just down the lane from them had a son named Henry who was in the grade above hers at school, and he had an uncanny knack for showing up at the exact time that Maggie usually went out to work. Steve had seen him out there after school many times, eagerly insisting that he could carry the sacks of garden soil for her, and he could run and get the shovel out of the shed for her, and shouldn't he do the pruning for her, too, so her hands didn't get blistered?

Of course, Maggie could have carried the heavy sacks more easily than Henry could, even if he didn't know it, but she always politely let him help and thanked him sweetly afterwards. Now that spring had arrived and there was no end of garden work to do, Dave had joked (out of earshot of Maggie, of course) that they might as well pitch a tent on the grass and let Henry live in the garden, since he was so determined to be helpful.

"Somehow I don't think his parents would approve," Sarah had said wryly.

"Are you kidding me?" Dave had shot back. "Did you see their eyes light up the moment they figured out your mom was _that_ Peggy Carter? Visions of political alliances were fairly dancing in their heads."

Henry's parents _were_ on the ambitious side, there was no doubt about it; Henry's father James had been an MP years ago, and his mother obviously wanted nothing more than to have an MP for a son as well. And Peggy had contacts in the royal family going all the way back to the war years, not to mention the various government officials she'd worked with during her years heading up S.H.I.E.L.D. She had never made a fuss of that kind of thing, but Henry's parents were eager to extract information from her about the various players whenever they had dinner together. They definitely didn't seem worried about the amount of time Henry was spending over here. The ladylike mannerisms that came so naturally to Maggie made her acceptable to them… and even if she had been raised American, she looked so quintessentially English that Steve had seen more than once the surprise in people's eyes when she opened her mouth and the accent gave her away. The truth was, Maggie had fit in here more readily than any of the rest of them had.

Steve strolled back toward the cottage, scissors in one hand and the bunch of flowers in the other, but when he came around the corner on his way to the back door, he came upon Maggie, not gardening after all but sitting on the stone bench by the budding rose bushes, with Henry sitting very close to her. His arm was around her shoulders and their heads were very close together, but both of them jumped visibly and pulled apart with alacrity, startled at Steve's abrupt appearance.

"Evening," Steve said them conversationally as he passed by, trying not to smile at the way they were both blushing furiously and looking anywhere but at him… or each other.

Inside the house it was fairly quiet; Joe and Amanda were both sitting at the kitchen table doing their homework, and Peggy was sitting with them, sipping at a cup of tea. Steve put the peonies in a vase and set it in the center of the table, and Peggy looked up at him, smiled warmly, and accepted a quick kiss from him. Joe and Amanda didn't even look up from their homework; they were used to that kind of thing from their grandma and grandpa.

Steve had hardly sat down at the table to join them when they all heard a familiar hissing sound, and moments later Bram walked into the room, sliding his sling ring off his hand and tucking it back into his pocket.

"You're home early," Peggy said, looking up from her tea with some surprise.

"It was a half day of school today," Bram explained, shrugging off his backpack and setting it in the corner. Usually he got home just as everyone was going to bed, thanks to the time zone differences. With only a few months left before graduation when they made the move to England, the family had decided not to complicate Bram's transition to college by transferring him to a foreign school at the last minute. Of course he couldn't keep going to school in Bethesda, since Hydra knew to look for them there, so he'd chosen practically at random a high school in Salt Lake City, Utah to finish out the year. The sling ring made everything simple and they were grateful for that, even if Bram was quietly disappointed to miss all the end-of-year celebrations with the friends he'd known all his life back in Bethesda.

Amanda glanced up from her homework and wrinkled her nose at Bram's school clothes disapprovingly. "You look like a Yankee tourist," she said. Steve and Peggy exchanged glances and fought to hide their smiles; for about a month after moving, Amanda had complained loudly and frequently about all the things the British did differently from Americans, and then one day had abruptly done a 180 and taken to lecturing everyone else in the family, including Peggy, about the _proper_ way to be British.

"I _am_ a Yankee tourist, sis," Bram said with good humor as he reached out and tugged teasingly on the lapels of her school uniform, getting an annoyed slap on his hands in return. He wasn't wrong, either. Since he was on a different schedule from the rest of them, he did his homework in the middle of the night, worked a graveyard shift as an aide at a nearby hospital, and then slept until past noon before getting up to portal himself to school again. England wasn't really home for him, it was just a place to sleep, particularly since he had already been accepted into the pre-med program at Baylor and intended to start for summer semester. In less than a month, he'd move out and be on his own.

"How's school, kiddo?" Bram asked Joe next, rumpling up his already-rumpled hair.

Joe didn't even bother to try smoothing his hair. "I won the Year 4 spelling bee today," he said, poking his chest out in visible pride.

"Serious?" Bram said over his shoulder, now on his way to the fridge. "For the whole school?"

Peggy nodded in confirmation; she and Steve had been there to see it. "He even remembered to spell things the British way."

"Nice job, bro," Bram said, sincere despite rummaging through the shelves, looking for something to eat. "Hey, where's Mom and Dad?"

"Downstairs in the lab," Steve answered. "They got a shipment today, so they're trying to get everything inventoried and rotated."

"Mmm. I'm gonna go help them," Bram said, sniffing at a Tupperware and then tucking it under his arm, grabbing a fork, and striding out of the room.

Silence fell once more, and Joe and Amanda both went back to their homework, only to be distracted 30 seconds later when another sparkling portal opened up, this time depositing Tien, Steven and Sammy into the kitchen.

"What is this, King's Cross Station?" Amanda asked impatiently, putting her pencil down a little too firmly on the table. "How am I supposed to get my math done?" Even the younger children in the family were accustomed to seeing portals now, although all the adults had agreed to wait until they were older, as they had with their siblings, to tell them about their super-soldier heritage and the Decimation that awaited them in the future. It was bad enough that they had been driven out of the homes without warning by Hydra; they deserved to have a childhood free of existential horrors, at least.

Joe, on the other hand, scrambled out of his seat and ran over to give his Aunt Tien an enthusiastic hug before she could even tuck her sling ring away — she had always been a favorite of his — and only as an afterthought did he think to hug his own brother.

"How was your lesson today?" Steve asked Steven.

"Good," he said quietly, giving Joe a quick squeeze back and then gently disentangling himself.

"He's downplaying," Tien said immediately, even as Steven strode out of the room, heading toward his bedroom. "Mike says he's starting to look like a pro. Harrison's having the time of his life fighting him. They'll be well-matched before long, we think. Is it all right if Sammy uses your piano while I'm here? Our keyboard doesn't have pedals, and her next recital has a few songs that really need them."

"Of course, darling," Peggy told Sammy, who had a folder of sheet music tucked under her arm. "Go ahead."

"I'll come hang out with you in a few minutes," Amanda called back as Sammy headed for the front room, which had come with the baby grand belonging to the previous owners for the simple reason that a wall would have to be knocked out to remove it. Luckily, Sammy had recently taken to music like a fish to water, and she put the piano to good use whenever she came over. Amanda would probably keep a steady stream of chatter going over Sammy's practicing, but unlike everyone else in the family, Sammy seemed to have an infinite capacity for listening to her. The two cousins had the oddest relationship; whenever they got together Amanda did practically all the talking, yet far from being annoyed by that, Sammy had always seemed well-satisfied with the dynamic. Given that she spent so much of her spare time alone tinkering around with computers, maybe it was a relief for her to have a social interaction that didn't require too much effort on her part.

Tien helped herself to a cup of tea and then sat down at the table, pulling a tape recorder and a small notebook out of her jacket pocket. "Ready to work on your memoirs?" she asked Peggy. From the other end of the house, they could hear Sammy starting up a song on the piano.

"It really should be _our_ memoirs," Peggy said, glancing at Steve. "It's extremely difficult to talk about my life without talking about yours, darling."

"Well, we're going to have to figure out a way to make it work," Tien said. They had already decided to write two versions of Peggy's memoirs; one heavily redacted version to release as soon as it was ready, and the full story to be released at a time yet to be determined. It would have to be after the reversal of the Snap, at the very least, and Steve already had a half-formed idea that he didn't want it released until after his death. He was used to being a nobody in the eyes of the world, and he had no desire to go back to the public life he had before. Between her memoirs and his comic books, their story would be preserved for the sake of history and all their descendants, and as far as he was concerned, that was all that mattered.

Tien flipped through her notebook to find the place where they had left off the night before, but when she found it she just sat there for a long moment, holding her teacup in one hand and pinching the bridge of her nose with the other, eyes squeezed shut as if she had a headache.

"Everything all right?" Peggy asked with a touch of concern.

Tien shook her head a little as she roused herself. "Oh, Clint was pitching a fit just now as we were trying to leave. I'm sure Mike has it handled by now. He was just… a little out of control. We're not sure what's going on with him. He's too old to be having tantrums like that, and he's too young to blame it on teenage hormones."

"Throwing a fit about what?" Steve asked.

Tien sighed heavily. "About how much he hates Vietnam. Says he doesn't belong there, he only looks like he does."

"Hates Vietnam?" Amanda repeated blankly, looking up from her math. "Why, what's wrong with Vietnam?"

Tien shrugged. "The weather. The school. The language. You name it, he's complained about it. Tonight he told us he hates the food my dad makes for us. It doesn't make a lot of sense; he's been eating pho his entire life, and I learned how to make it from Dad. He used to like it just fine." She sighed again, looking frustrated, and Steve could hardly blame her. For years she had taken the kids for visits to Vietnam as often as she had been able to, and now that they lived there she obviously wanted them to know and love that part of their heritage. It had to be a disappointment to meet with resistance.

"Are the other kids adjusting okay?" Steve asked.

"Natty loves it there," Tien said frankly. "She learned the language so fast she almost sounds native now. She's working at the Vo Binh Dinh school in Qui Nhon, teaching the younger students, and she's started dating one of the other instructors. I've even been portaling her to a ballet school in Ho Chi Minh, even though she could take her lessons in America or anywhere else if she wanted to. As for Harrison, well, you know him. He's always rolled with the punches. He doesn't really care where he lives as long as he gets in his fighting lessons. Sammy's doing fine, too. She has her piano and her programming club. Even _she_ doesn't understand what Clint's problem is. And they used to be so close."

"Strange," Peggy murmured, looking concerned. Steve felt the same way. Clint had always been the jokester in the family, the one who goofed around and made the rest of them laugh, even the ones like his cousin Steven who were inclined to be a little too serious. He must have taken the abrupt move badly. Well, he was bound to adjust eventually, like Amanda had. Soon enough he'd be cracking jokes like his old self, Steve had no doubt.

"Well, let's get started," Tien said, changing the subject with an effort. "You left off telling me about meeting Mary from MI6, I think."

Tien started the tape recorder, and Peggy started explaining how she'd been trained for espionage before being hired by the SSR to track down Dr. Erskine. Given that he didn't have much to contribute to this part of the story, since it was before his time, after a few minutes Steve got up and went searching for Steven.

He found his grandson in his bedroom, still dressed in his workout clothes, hunched over a sketch pad.

"Hey, Grandpa," Steven said, not even taking his pencil off the paper as he glanced up distractedly.

"What are you drawing?" Steve asked curiously.

Steven added several more lines in silence before answering. "The Triskelion."

He laid his pencil down long enough to choose another one that was sharper, and now Steve could see that he hadn't drawn the Triskelion as it existed today, he had drawn it as it appeared on the day of the Hydra Uprising, with massive damage to one of the towers from its collision with the helicarrier and a thick plume of smoke rising up into the sky. It wasn't a replication of the scene Steve himself had created for his comic books, though. It had been drawn from a completely different angle. All in all, not bad work for someone who was recreating an event he hadn't even seen. Even incomplete, the sketch succeeded in giving Steve an uncomfortable shudder down his spine, which was fitting for the subject matter.

He walked over to the neatly made bed and lowered himself down to it with a soft groan. "I hear from your Uncle Mike that you're working hard, learning fast," he told Steven.

"I'm trying my best," Steven said seriously.

"Sounds like it's paying off. So what do you like about fighting?" Steve asked him.

Steven looked up at him blankly for a long moment, and then said: "I like it when I get better at it."

"Why is that?"

A frown appeared between his eyes. "Isn't it obvious?"

"I want to know what you think."

Steven looked at him steadily, sketch forgotten. "You're worried about me. Why? I'm just doing the same thing Harrison is. The same thing _you_ did."

Steve chose his next words carefully. "Your mother said Frank Rumlow said some things to you. About how boys need to be raised, how they're supposed to act. And Steven… Brock Rumlow once said something to me that made me think his father mistreated him as a matter of course when he was a boy. I don't want you taking notes on the right way to be a man from someone like that."

Steven stiffened noticeably. "I'm not doing this because of _that_."

Steve nodded, relieved. "Good. Because there's no one in this family that you need to impress. Not all of us are fighters, and there's nothing wrong with that."

"I'm not trying to impress anyone," Steven said impatiently.

"Then what is this about? Because your mother and I don't see you taking a lot of pleasure in what you're doing."

"You're worried because I _don't_ take pleasure in learning how to hurt people?" Steven shot back.

"We're just trying to understand."

Steven's chest rose up as he took in several sharp breaths, growing visibly upset. "Mom didn't want to fight either. She didn't want to hurt people. And she had to do it… because of _me_! Because I didn't know how to fight for myself! I was strong enough, I was stronger than _he_ was, but I just- I _froze_!"

"That's a common response," Steve said gently. "It has to be trained out of soldiers-"

"Exactly," Steven said forcefully. "So I'm getting it trained out of me. If something like that happens again, no one will have to fight for me. I'll be able to take care of myself. Maybe even help the people around me, so _they_ don't have to fight. I'm doing this to help people!"

"Okay," Steve said in placating tones. "Okay. I think it's good for you to want to help others." He took a deep breath. "I hope you aren't worrying more than you need to about your mother. You're right that fighting has never been her first choice, but she told me she doesn't have any regrets about what she did back in December. The two of you kept some very dangerous information out of Hydra's hands. You both saved lives. And the men who attacked you forfeited their own lives when they chose to endanger the innocent. Your mother understands that."

"I know," Steven said with a touch of weariness. "I do, too. But this is something I need to do, Grandpa. Please don't try to talk me out of it. I can do this. I really can."

* * *

**1992-1996**

The next year passed by in a blur. Dave and Sarah's St. Raphael's Medical Services took off so quickly that they began making plans to open a second clinic, finding no shortage of former Kamar-Taj trainees who wanted to sign on to help. Steve and Peggy did what they could to help, handling some of the bookkeeping and administration tasks to keep Dave and Sarah free to focus on the medical side of things. Finding last-chance patients who were willing to try something unorthodox turned out to be less complicated than they had feared, especially once the patients discovered the treatment was far less expensive than any other experimental options out there. Their grateful patients were quietly spreading the word, and they were saving lives at a steadily increasing rate.

Bram had moved to Texas and quickly immersed himself in his pre-med studies at Baylor, although he portaled over to England as often as he could to keep up on the various innovations in magical healing that his parents and their employees were developing. It went without saying that he would take his place at the clinic, too, once his education was complete.

Meanwhile, Natty, whose balletic skills had taken a meteoric rise during her last year in high school, ended up deciding to move to Russia, where she had access to the best schools. Her boyfriend was also a student at the same ballet school, at least until she got a new boyfriend. And then a different one. And then another one. Mike and Tien took to quietly rolling their eyes whenever Natty told them she was bringing over someone to meet them. All the boys she brought were nice enough, and the breakups were never ugly or dramatic affairs, she just… changed her mind a lot.

And in the midst of all of it, Peggy got to meet Sharon Carter at last.

Sharon's parents, Richard and Anne, had been living in Ontario for many years, but somehow they had never made it down to the States to visit Peggy while she lived there. But Anne's parents still lived in England, and so they came overseas for a two-week visit every summer to see them. Now that Peggy was in England too, they made a point of spending time with her as well.

As Sharon had long ago explained to Steve after the funeral, her familial connection to the Carters was a little more complicated than the title "Great-Aunt" implied. Peggy's brother Michael, who had been killed in action during the war, had left behind a widow who had not even given birth to their first child yet when she got the news. Helen Carter had eventually remarried and moved to Canada with her new husband, where she had two more children: including Richard, Sharon's father. Peggy's parents Amanda and Harrison had nevertheless considered all three of Helen's children as their grandchildren, even if only one of them was related by blood.

And it would seem Helen had felt the same way. Her second marriage had ended in a messy divorce, and she ended up once again taking the name Carter as a surname and changing the surnames of all three children. And so Sharon and her brother Matthew had wound up with the Carter name, too, despite being related only by marriage.

Steve made himself scarce the day Richard and Anne brought Sharon and her brother Matthew to their cottage in Winchester to meet Peggy. There wasn't really much danger in letting Sharon see him — after all, the chances of her drawing any connection between the old man he was now and the young man she would meet 20 years in the future were slim — but he was curiously incurious to see what Sharon had been like as a child. Peggy seemed puzzled by his attitude; after all, he had been delighted to have that brief run-in with a 4-year-old Tony back in the 70s. But she knew that it was her own relationship with Sharon that needed to be cultivated, and so she dropped the subject and focused on getting to know Sharon and helping to awaken in her a desire for a career at S.H.I.E.L.D.

It didn't seem like it would be a difficult task. As Peggy told Steve afterward, Sharon had an irrepressible sense of adventure that clearly alarmed her more staid mother. And she was fearless. In the afternoon Peggy walked out to show Anne the garden only for them to find a 7-year-old Sharon perched at the very top of the maple tree, breathless with pride in her own accomplishment. Instantly her horrified mother dashed over to ransack the garden shed in a desperate search for a ladder to help coax her back down to the ground.

"Sharon got herself up," Peggy had told her coolly. "She can get herself down again, I'm sure." And just as she said, when Sharon saw her Aunt Sarah laying out a table of scones and tea in the shade of the maple tree half an hour later, she got herself down in a matter of minutes with nothing more than a few scrapes on her elbows and knees to show for it.

All of Steve and Peggy's grandchildren were older than Sharon — the youngest, Joe, had almost four years on her, while Bram and Natty had her beat by more than a decade — but even the ones who lived in other countries now managed to arrange to be around the day Sharon came, curious to meet her. By the time she left and Steve had emerged from the basement lab where he'd kept himself busy working on some sketches that had needed his attention anyway, they were already talking about Sharon like she was some sort of kid sister, to be petted and fussed over when she came again this time next year.

"It's kind of funny to think of her having the guts to try to fight Bucky one day," Harrison said musingly. "She looks like she just stepped out of Grandma's old copy of 'Goldilocks and the Three Bears,' for Pete's sake. And she doesn't even have a secret boost like the rest of us."

"She's gonna save your life one day, Grandpa," Bram said, looking modestly impressed.

"That's more than any of us can say," Natty added.

"That we know of," Steven added quietly.

Maggie was the next to leave home, moving to London and getting hired to help run a children's charity that Henry's mother had founded there. Dave and Sarah had tried to convince her to go to college first, but it was exactly the kind of thing she had always dreamed of doing and she felt that the opportunity was too good to pass up. And it didn't hurt that Henry was going to Oxford now, just a train ride away, which seemed to settle the question in Maggie's mind.

Clint became the second-to-last grandchild to be told the family secret… and the first to take the news badly. He had already harbored a long-simmering grudge over being uprooted from his life in America without warning, and finding out that it was the result of a long chain of events that had started well before he was born and continued on throughout his childhood without his knowledge sent him into a spiral of outbursts and defiance that made daily life miserable for the rest of his family.

Harrison escaped it soon enough when he graduated from high school and was promptly hired as a security guard for Stark Industries, but that left Sammy to bear the brunt of it, along with Mike and Tien, who were at a loss as to how to help him. There were days when Clint was his old self: cracking jokes and making everyone laugh like always. But other days, he seemed to be a different person. His grades were slipping, but he lacked the motivation to do anything about it. And unlike the other grandchildren, he didn't have any school subjects or even hobbies that he was passionate about.

They all worried about Clint, but it was worst for Sammy. Once the two of them had been so close that Tien had sometimes jokingly referred to them twins. Now she was being pushed out of his circle. Clint was spending as much time as he could outside the home with his friends, several of whom were not exactly the kind of people his parents wanted him to run around with. Mike and Tien didn't want to be overly controlling parents, and yet it was clear that Clint's friends were not a good influence on him, and their attempts at love and persuasion weren't having the effect they hoped for. Sammy did what she could, but her efforts were rebuffed as thoroughly as Mike and Tien's were.

Steve worried about Clint, too, but in some ways he worried about Steven more, for reasons he could not explain fully even to Peggy when she pressed him on it. And yet on the surface Steven was a model child. His grades at school were always outstanding. His artwork was genuinely good, sometimes startlingly so considering his age. And he threw himself into his training with his Uncle Mike with an enthusiasm that exceeded even Harrison's. Steve sometimes watched their sessions and found himself taken aback at times at the fluidity of Steven's movements, the speed of his attacks, the lightning-fast tactical calculations he made that could catch even Mike off-guard.

Maybe it wasn't fair of him to worry like that. Harrison had loved to fight from a very young age, and they had never worried about _him_. But Harrison had always taken a rough kind of joy in what he did, whereas Steven only seemed to feel a grim satisfaction at a job well done. Steve couldn't shake the feeling that something was off. As he approached the end of high school, Steven made up his mind that he was going to join the Marines. And not just the Marines… MARSOC. The best of the best. There was no doubt in Mike or Steve's mind that he'd be able to do it, either. He had the ability and the drive.

"I hear the weather's nice in Colorado Springs this time of year," Steve said to Steven mildly one day as he was poring over the fitness requirements for Officer Candidate School in Quantico, Virginia and sketching out a workout plan for himself.

"I'm joining the Marines, Grandpa," Steven said flatly without looking up. "Not the Air Force."

"I think you'd do well in the Air Force."

"I know what you're thinking," Steven said.

"Do you?"

Steven met his eyes with a hint of accusation. "Sam Wilson started at the Academy this year. You think if I join too, I can meet him, and then we can be friends."

"You'd be a good influence on him. The way your Uncle Mike is influencing Clint Barton now."

Steven scoffed softly. "Come on, Grandpa. You want _him_ to be a good influence on _me_. You want him to tell me to chill out, just like he used to tell you."

"Sometimes I needed to hear that."

"I'm chill, Grandpa," Steven said quietly. "I am very, very chill. And I will continue to be chill until I get commissioned into the Marines. I can't join the Air Force. I'm going to be at the top of the game, and what would happen if they chose me for their experimental Pararescue unit and I ended up taking Sam or Reilly's place? That would mess up everything, don't you think?"

Steve sighed. "I guess so."

* * *

**1997**

The summer sun beat down as the newest graduating class for the Officer Candidate School paraded across the asphalt at the Marine Corps Base Quantico, led by a color guard and a marching band, all of them marching in time to the music.

The columns of marching men were indistinguishable from one another at first glance, all neatly dressed in their uniforms, arms and legs swinging in perfect synchronization, but it didn't take long for Steve to spot Steven in their midst as they drew closer; some subtlety in the way he held himself that made him stand out to Steve's eyes. Steven's chin was up proudly, uniform immaculate, hair buzzed short under his cap and his blue eyes bright and intense as he marched crisply past.

Peggy was there by Steve's side, shading herself from the fierce morning sun with an umbrella, arm in arm with Amanda who had dyed her hair bright red to celebrate the end of her sophomore year in high school, much to her mother's displeasure. Sarah and Dave were watching the parade hand in hand, looking every bit as proud and tearful as the parents of a Marine had a right to be. Maggie was there too, with the sunlight sparkling off her engagement ring — Henry had finally popped the question, and the cottage in Winchester had recently become wedding central, with magazines of dresses and flowers and linen-draped receptions strewn on every surface — while Joe stood by her, scribbling in his notebook as fast as he could as the men went marching by. He was assigned to write several stories about interesting events over the summer for his school newspaper, a task he took very seriously.

The only one missing was Bram. He was sorry to miss his little brother's big day, but he had a final at Baylor scheduled for the exact time as the ceremony, and even with his sling ring he couldn't be in two places at once.

After the parade was completed, they all filed inside to watch the graduates take their oath of enlistment. Steven's voice rang out over the others as he swore in a firm voice to defend the Constitution of the United States and obey all lawful orders. Steve felt a pulse of nostalgic pride, remembering the day he had recited those same words. It seemed like that had been a lifetime ago, and yet even after he had left the Army he had felt the weight of that oath. He still felt it today.

After the formalities were over, Steve and Peggy stood with Maggie, Amanda and Joe as they watched Dave carefully pin the rank bar on Steven's uniform while Sarah, smiling through her tears, took a steady stream of pictures. Just then, Steve felt a buzzing in his pocket, and took out his cell phone to see that Mike was calling him.

The cell phones available in this time weren't particularly advanced or reliable, at least not by Steve's standards, but everyone in their family had them now, for safety reasons as much as anything. They had no reason to believe Hydra had been able to track down their locations again, but they had adopted a policy of strong caution, and the cell phones meant that if any of them got into trouble, they could contact someone with a sling ring who could extract them from a situation.

Steve stepped away from the others and answered the phone. "Hello?"

Mike's voice crackled over the line. "Dad. I'm not interrupting the ceremony, am I?"

"No, we're just taking pictures now. What's going on?"

"I have a feeling this is a futile question," Mike said, sounding strangely reluctant, "but is there any chance, any chance at all, that Clint is there with you?"

Steve frowned. "Clint? No, he isn't. He isn't home?"

"He never came home from school today. I've tried calling around to all the usual places. All his friends claim he isn't with them. I mean, I wouldn't put it past them to lie to me about that, but-" Mike sighed heavily into the receiver. "He's been missing for hours. Tien's getting frantic. Maybe he just wandered off somewhere with a friend, but if it's something else…" He didn't need to fill in the blanks. Ever since Steven's ordeal with Hydra, they all had fears that no length of time had been able to soothe.

Steve was quiet for a long moment, his mind racing. "We're almost done here," he said at last. "I could have Sarah portal some of us over there to Qui Nhon to help you look. Maybe we can get Bram to come, too. I'm not sure when his final was, but he might be done by now."

"I don't want to wreck Steven's big day, but…"

"No, he'll understand," Steve said quickly. "He'll be worried too. Let me call Bram right now. He might be able to come right away while I get everyone else rounded up here."

"Okay," Mike sounded intensely relieved. "Thanks, Dad."

"Yeah. Don't worry. We'll find him."

Steve hung up, and then immediately called Bram. To his relief, Bram answered right away, and when Steve asked he said he had just gotten back from taking his final. Steve started to explain to him what was happening, but before he'd gotten far, Bram stopped him.

"Clint?" he said with audible surprise. "But he's here."

Steve paused. "He's there? With you, in Waco?"

"Yeah," Bram said. "Well, not _here_ here. He called me a couple hours ago and said his parents said it was okay for him to come visit, so I opened a portal for him. I told him I had to cram and then go take my test, but he said it was okay, he didn't mind. He just went out to walk around and explore the town for a while. I kinda figured he'd be here by the time I finished, and I left my door unlocked for him, but he still isn't back."

"His parents are looking for him on the wrong _continent_," Steve said, a surge of frustration and worry rushing over him. "Bram, I'm gonna call them now. Call me right away if Clint shows up. Or call your Uncle Mike. He didn't tell his parents where he was going."

"Oh, fantastic," Bram said grimly. "Okay, I'll let you know. Maybe some of my neighbors saw which way he walked."

The next hour was a chaotic muddle of Steve giving the news over the phone to Mike and Tien — who decided to portal themselves and Sammy over to Bram's apartment to start searching — and then explaining the situation to Sarah, who hurried over to give Steven an apologetic goodbye before portaling over to Bram's along with Maggie so they could help look. Steve and Peggy stayed with Dave and the younger kids to finish celebrating Steven's commissioning, although everyone including Steven was so worried that it was hard to give his accomplishment the attention it deserved.

It was another hour before Mike called back to say that Clint had finally shown up at Bram's apartment, safe and sound. He managed to sound both relieved and infuriated at the same time, and when Sarah and Maggie came back to the Marine base through a discreetly placed portal, Steve and Peggy glanced at each other and didn't even need to discuss it; Peggy immediately asked Sarah to send them both to Mike and Tien's home in Vietnam, which Sarah promptly did.

It was after sunset in Qui Nhon when Steve and Peggy arrived, and Clint was standing in the middle of the living room, scowling at nothing in particular outside the darkened window while Mike stood right in front of him, face flushed with anger and voice raised, while Tien stood a few steps back, hand pressed over her mouth and her eyes glistening with tears. Sammy was hovering at the back of the room, hunched in on herself in silent distress, and Peggy immediately reached out for her and put a comforting arm around her shoulder.

"-you got everyone worked up and you wrecked Steven's day!" Mike was barking at Clint. "And what's worse, you dragged Bram into this! He's a student, he has work to do, he doesn't have time to babysit you when you're acting like this! You are _16_! That's plenty old enough to have a little sense by now. Your mother thought you'd been taken by Hydra!"

Clint unexpectedly laughed.

"Is that a _joke_ to you?" Mike demanded angrily.

"Why would Hydra want _me_?" Clint asked with a hint of amusement, not taking his eyes off the window. "I'm nobody."

"That isn't true, and you know it. There's plenty of things they could do with you, and you wouldn't like any of it."

"Yeah, well, I didn't ask for that, did I?" Clint snapped, the smile suddenly fading from his face as he turned to face Mike for the first time. "I didn't ask for any of this. Normal kids don't have to worry about being kidnapped by terrorists. Maybe you should have thought of that before you chose your profession."

"You're blaming this on _me_?" Mike pressed his lips together and visibly restrained himself from speaking for a long moment. Finally, he took a deep breath and started again, a little more quietly. "Clint, I hold responsibility for everything I've done and for all the consequences that followed. But I am not responsible for _your_ choices, and lately you've been making a lot of terrible ones. You want to explain to us just what you were doing today, while the whole family was in an uproar worrying about you?"

"You really don't want to know, Dad," Clint said wryly.

"No, I really think I do."

Clint laughed again. "You really don't."

"Do you seriously think I couldn't find out if I wanted to? You might as well make it easier on yourself, and tell me where you were." Mike voice went deeper. "_Now_."

Clint shrugged. "Okay. If you insist." He reached over and began rolling up his sleeve. When he had it up, he deftly unwound a bandage that was wrapped around his upper arm and, once it was off, flexed his bicep for them.

There was a scrawl of dark ink across it, in the shape of a coiling dragon. The skin around the design was bright red with irritation, the skin cracked and bleeding in places. Sammy and Peggy both gasped together, and even Steve was taken aback.

"Is that- is that _real_?" Tien blurted out.

"Oh, yeah," Clint said easily. "At least, it sure _felt_ like it. Hurt like the devil. That's normal, right? But this is only phase one. I gotta go back in a while to get it worked on again."

"Like hell you are!" Mike shouted. "A _tattoo_? What did you go and do that for?"

Clint shrugged, winding the bandage around his arm again. "Wanted to."

"You're gonna have to do better than that."

"What's the big deal? I'm just doing what my dear old namesake did. Will do. Whatever. Seemed fitting."

Mike's face turned to stone. By now he knew Hawkeye well enough to care for him on a personal level, and he obviously found the comparison wildly out of bounds. "He lost his wife and all his children on the same day," Mike said icily. "What did you lose? A card game?"

Clint raised his eyebrows, but didn't bother answering.

"Who did this for you?" Mike demanded, finding a fresh line of attack. "You have to have permission-"

"-if you're a minor," Clint finished calmly. "Oh, don't blame the tattoo parlor, Dad. They asked for my birth certificate, and I showed it to them. That program you installed on your computer to help you make fake IDs? It really came in handy. I think that might be the first time I was actually _glad_ that you're a spy."

Mike was so bewildered that his anger ebbed for a moment, and he looked at Tien uncertainly. "I had that password-protected-"

"Seriously, Dad? Your daughter's a literal computer hacker, she can break programs like that wide open with one hand behind her back."

Sammy started visibly as everyone turned around to look at her. "Dad, I didn't do that!" she objected vehemently. "I never hacked your stuff, I _swear_-"

"You leave your disks lying around where anyone could pick them up," Clint pointed out. "Remember that day you explained to me how you run them?"

"Dad, I didn't know that he would-" Sammy started to say, tears springing to her eyes.

"I know, Sammy," Mike said flatly. "I know. No one's blaming you."

"Oh, no, Sammy never does anything wrong," Clint said, his voice thick with sarcasm. "No one in this family does. Just me. _I'm_ the lucky one."

"When you do things no one else in the family has ever done, you lose your right to complain about being treated differently from everyone else," Mike said grimly.

The next few months that followed weren't any easier than that night had been. Clint's tattoo faded within a few weeks — he was gifted with the same healing factor they all had, and his body recognized the tattoo as the damage that it was and repaired it — but somehow he managed to slip away from home to get a new one, unfortunately just two days before Maggie's wedding. Then he got everyone into an uproar again by refusing to wear a long-sleeved shirt to cover up the half-healed wound, unmoved by Henry's mother's horrified reaction and even Maggie's quiet pleas, until finally Steven of all people pulled him aside and had a conversation too quiet for any of the rest of them to hear, after which Clint by some miracle agreed to cover it up and even spent the wedding day cracking jokes like he was his old self again.

But the change didn't last long. Soon enough he was sneaking out again, and this time Mike and Tien strongly suspected he was drinking with some of his friends.

"Which is stupid, because he can't get drunk any more than the rest of us can," Mike said in frustration when he and Tien came over to the cottage to give Steve and Peggy the latest update.

"It makes about as much sense as him getting tattoos he knows are going to fade," Tien said.

"Can't you track him when he leaves the house?" Peggy asked with a frown.

"I can, and I have," Mike said. "But last night when he realized I was following him, he took off running. And when I say running, I mean at top speed."

"Did you run after him?" Steve asked, concerned.

"How could I?" Mike said helplessly. "The only thing that could possibly attract more attention than some kid running down the streets of Qui Nhon at Usain Bolt speeds would be a 50-year-old guy chasing after him just as fast. And I what would I have done when I caught up to him? He isn't a Hydra agent. I can't _force_ him into behaving."

"Sammy's moving out in two weeks to start at MIT," Tien said quietly. "Maybe things will be better once we can give him our full attention."

It wasn't an unreasonable hope, and in the year that followed Clint did make some improvements. He managed to get his grades up somewhat, and when Natty finally found a boyfriend she was ready to stick with — a young Vietnamese man named Quyen who had just snagged a promising job at an engineering firm in Ho Chi Mihn City — Clint kept everyone laughing at the wedding reception with his good-natured jokes about Quyen's newfound fondness for the ballet that had mysteriously developed after he'd met Natty.

He even managed to coax the whole family, introverts and all, out onto the dance floor for Chumbawamba's "Tubthumping," although he had help with that. A vivacious young woman who had briefly trained at Kamar-Taj before joining Sarah and Dave's magical medical staff, Aliyah, had come to the wedding as Bram's date, and he seemed willing enough to be dragged out onto the dance floor by her as long as it meant he got to hold her hands and watch her gleefully rock out to the song, even if he was a lousy dancer himself. Natty and Quyen, in wedding dress and tuxedo, looked as comfortable bouncing around to this song as they had slow-dancing to "Truly Madly Deeply" just a few minutes before.

Meanwhile Clint was practically manhandling Steven onto the floor and Steven was letting him do it with a gentle resignation, especially once his little sister Amanda rescued him by grabbing his hands and jumping up and down enthusiastically, a straightforward enough dance move that even a too-dignified Marine could copy. Meanwhile Harrison was surrounded by laughing bridesmaids and didn't seem to mind a bit.

After a little more coaxing from Clint, Sammy and Joe pulled their parents out onto the floor and got them to dance, too. But Steve and Peggy exchanged glances and then kept themselves firmly in their seats when Clint beckoned at them imperiously.

"I need a slow dance for my sweetheart," Steve explained when Clint came closer to them with hands spread and brow scrunched up as if to say "Well?" Maggie and Henry seemed to have the same idea as him; they were slow-dancing on the grass some distance away, in complete defiance of the fast beat. Clint let out an exaggerated sigh, and then promised he'd have the DJ play something slower for them next, a promise he made good on. Of course, he had an all-too-innocent expression plastered on his face when Celine Dion began crooning "My Heart Will Go On" and audible groans could be heard across the dance floor. Not that Steve and Peggy let that stop them from enjoying their dance in the slightest.

Months later, Steve often thought of that day, and wondered what had gone so badly wrong after that.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

New family tree (spouses in parentheses) and cheat sheet on everyone's locations, since they've scattered to the four winds:

**Sarah** (Dave), running St. Raphael's Medical Services headquartered in Winchester, England. Their children:

** Bram**, 24, medical student at Baylor University in Texas

**Maggie** (Henry), 22, living in London and working at a children's nonprofit

**Steven**, 19, based at Marine Corps Base in Twentyninepalms, California

**Amanda**, 17, high school student in Winchester, England

**Joe**, 15, high school student in Winchester, England

* * *

**Mike** (Tien), living in Qui Nhon, Vietnam, training Clint Barton in Washington, D.C. Their children:

**Natty** (Quyen), 23, ballet dancer, living in Ho Chi Minh City

**Harrison**, 21, living in New York City, working for Stark Industries

**Sammy**, 19, student at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts

**Clint,** 17, high school student in Qui Nhon, Vietnam

* * *

_Reviews are welcome!_


	27. Chapter 27

_**Author's note: **Thanks to jerseydanielgibson, Guests (thanks to the one who reminded me about the Marines rule, which I knew once upon a time but apparently forgot!), MagicLia16, Guiltypleasure82, girliemom and Nimrodel101 for your reviews. And especially thank you, W. Blackbird, for yours, because you helped crystallize some of my thinking regarding what I aimed to do with Clint's character._

_There will be an updated family tree at the end of the chapter. _

* * *

**1998**

Clint stayed on his best behavior for the rest of the summer, and Mike and Tien felt hopeful that the worst of it was behind them.

But everything fell apart when his senior year started. He started leaving school in the middle of the day and disappearing for long periods of time, and this time no amount of persuasion or threat from his parents seemed able to move him from his chosen course.

"Is he drinking again?" Steve asked one night after Mike had called to say that Clint had yet again broken his curfew.

"I think it's worse than that," Mike said grimly. "The alcohol isn't really enough to do anything for him. I think he's doing something stronger now."

Steve's heart throbbed painfully, thinking of it. The number of patients he had seen going through something like this... and now it was his own family. He'd never seriously thought it could happen to them, but he should have known better. No family was immune.

"He's trying to escape something," he told Mike after a beat.

"I know. I _know_. We've tried to talk to him about it, so we can figure out how to address it in a healthier way. And all we get is the same old rants about how he hates Vietnam, and he hates school, and he hates living under the rules we came up with to keep the kids safe after what happened in Bethesda. He keeps saying he wants to be free to _live_, but apparently what he means by that is to be free to ignore his homework and do whatever idiotic thing pops into his head at any moment, no matter how dangerous." Mike sighed heavily into the phone. "I mean, he has less than a year until graduation. You would think he could just buckle down and tough it out until he's done, and then he can move out and go back to America like Harrison and Sammy did. But he won't. He isn't even making plans for after graduation. If college isn't his thing, fine, but it's not like he has any ideas about how he's going to support himself. For a kid who acts like all he wants to do is get away from his family, he isn't doing one thing to make that possible."

"Does he feel pressure to succeed?" Steve asked. "Sometimes people escape that by giving up. Pretending like they don't care anymore."

"Tien and I tried not to do that," Mike said. "With _any_ of the kids. And we've told Clint outright that he doesn't have to try to be Clint Barton, or Steve Rogers, or anyone but himself. There _are_ things he's good at. You've seen how he can get the whole family laughing. It's more than just having a good sense of humor. You remember how Sammy used to get so tense when she was in a big group of people? The way she used to just fade to the back of the room and check out, more or less? He was the only one of us who could draw her out and get her laughing and relaxed enough to learn how to deal with that kind of setting. People are drawn to him. That's a gift, and there are about a million things he could do with it. But he won't even try."

"Let me talk to him," Steve said. "I think you and Tien are doing all the right things, but he's dug in his heels with you. He might open up more to someone he doesn't see as his disciplinarian."

In the weeks that followed, Steve did his best. But Clint stubbornly stonewalled him, even if he did it more respectfully than he had done it to his own parents. The behavior problems continued, until the breaking point was finally reached: the day an increasingly vigilant Tien found drugs hidden in Clint's bedroom.

After everything was said and done, Mike and Tien made the difficult decision to pull Clint out of school and check him into a treatment facility that promised to address both the substance abuse and provide intensive behavioral counseling.

It was a decision that Clint strenuously resisted. But Tien in particular remained adamant; as much as Clint might hate the idea of being in a heavily supervised treatment facility for three months, he'd hate being in jail even more. Mike seemed less sure, wanting to deal with it within the family if they could, but eventually he yielded. He didn't have to say it, but Steve could see it in his eyes: Mike was worried about his marriage, too. The continual conflict had been hard on them both, and Steve knew all too well that when one family member self-destructed, sometimes they took others down with them. It was bad enough that Mike was watching one of his children slip away from him. He couldn't lose his wife, too.

They all hoped that the treatment facility would make progress where their family had not. But one day, while Amanda and Joe were at school and Dave and Sarah had just come upstairs from the lab to have lunch with Steve and Peggy, Mike showed up at the cottage.

"How is Clint doing?" Dave asked, gesturing at him to sit at the table and join them.

"Well," Mike said with his tone carefully controlled as he sat down but ignored the plate Sarah slid toward him, "he checked himself out of the treatment facility last night."

"He checked _himself_ out?" Sarah repeated in confusion. "I thought he could only be released to his parents. How did he do that?"

"Oh, he did it real subtle," Mike said with a twist of sarcasm. "Slammed his shoulder against a locked door and knocked it out of its frame. Ran across the lawn, jumped clean over the fence, sprinted down the road at top speed. Security cameras everywhere. Not a brain in his head." He rubbed his forehead wearily as the rest of them stared at him in shock. "Now I've got explanations to invent and damages to pay. And I can't ever take him back to a place like that again." He shrugged his broad shoulders helplessly. "What would stop him from doing it again?"

"How did you find him?" Peggy asked, concerned.

"Looked in the usual places. Found him in a tattoo parlor, high as a kite, drawing up a new design for himself. Luckily I got there before they got started on him."

"High on _what_?" Steve asked.

"I don't know. He wouldn't tell me. Must've been something pretty strong for it to work on him at all."

"Where is he now?" Sarah asked, half-standing up, looking deeply concerned. "Do you need me to examine him?"

"I'd be glad if you did, although whatever it was, it seems to have worn off pretty quick."

Sarah slid her sling ring onto her fingers. "He's home?"

Mike nodded. "Tien's watching him. She has her sling ring ready just in case, but I don't think he'll try to run away again today. He knows he took it too far. I think he scared even himself this time."

Sarah vanished into a portal, and then Peggy broke the silence that followed.

"What will you do now?" she asked.

Mike shook his head in weary defeat. "I don't know. I just don't know."

"You know, it's ironic," he added after a long pause, his eyes going distant. "I used to worry about this with Steven, when I was teaching him how to fight. The day I realized he had surpassed Harrison, and with me starting to slow down, I thought: if something ever happens, if Steven ever snaps for some reason... we'd have a hard time stopping him."

He took in a deep breath. "But it's my own son I should have worried about." Bitterness flashed across his face. "There's no reason to think this won't keep escalating. If he ever commits a serious crime... I mean, they haven't built a prison yet that can hold a Rogers. As bad as it is now, it could still get worse."

"So far the only person Clint has hurt is himself," Steve pointed out. "It's not gonna come to that."

Mike was in no mood to be comforted. "We can't be sure," he said. "I just keep thinking... here Sarah's been so determined all this time not to use the serum to create new supersoldiers because she thought it was too dangerous. But we've been creating them anyway, haven't we?" He laughed humorlessly. "We've all been merrily building our families, assuming it wouldn't be a problem because we raised them right from the day they were born. But that isn't a guarantee, is it? Every one of them is their own person. They can choose whoever they want to be. And if they choose badly..." He trailed off.

* * *

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Peggy asked Steve that evening after dinner, when they had escaped the clatter in the cottage. Amanda had been loudly chattering into the phone with one of her friends, while Joe had been passionately ranting to his dad about the tight control the high school administration had imposed on the student newspaper he was trying to start up, and so Steve and Peggy had gone outside to sit in the peace and quiet of the garden.

"What are you thinking?" Steve asked her.

Peggy reached down and picked an orange chrysanthemum, rolling its stem between her fingers thoughtfully. "That if Clint needs professional help — and I think he does — but we can't risk sending him back to a facility for fear his reckless behavior will blow our family's cover..." She met his eyes firmly. "Steve, we ought to take him in ourselves. You and I."

Steve didn't answer right away. He _had_ been thinking the same thing, but there were considerations. A lot of them.

"We wouldn't be able to stop him from running away any more than his parents or the treatment facility could," he pointed out.

"No," Peggy admitted. "But I don't think this can be fixed by force. Bringing him here could solve a number of problems. For one thing, we'd change the dynamics he and Mike and Tien have been locked into for so long. We'd give him a fresh start. For another, we'd distance him from his so-called friends in Quy Nhon who keep dragging him back down into the gutter."

"He'd just find new 'friends' here."

"Not if we don't send him back to school," Peggy said. "At this point his education has already been so disrupted that I think we'd be better off getting some textbooks and just have him finish up at home. I could help him with that. And if and when he acts up, you'd be right here to handle it."

Steve sighed. "I'd do my best. I've helped patients through things like this before. But Peggy, when it's our own family and our own home, it might be... different."

"I wasn't thinking you were qualified to do this because of any certification," Peggy said firmly. "Long before that, you were helping people like Wanda Maximoff go straight. Even some of the other Avengers — people who had pasts, people who could potentially be dangerous if they lost self-control — you loved them and you accepted them. You made them family. And they responded to that."

"I'm more than willing to do it for Clint," Steve said, anxious that she not misunderstand. "It's you I'm worried about. We came here so you could retire. And now we're talking about going all the way back to being parents again. With a child who... isn't much like ours were."

"I won't get any rest until Clint finds his," Peggy said with certainty. "And I can't bear to see our son looking the way he looked tonight. If we can take some of the burden off his shoulders, even for a little while-"

"Okay," Steve said readily. "Okay. We'll offer."

* * *

After talking it over, Mike and Tien agreed to give their plan a try. Sarah and Dave were on board too, and Amanda and Joe were ready to do what they could to help their cousin, even knowing it might disrupt their own home life.

And so as soon as Clint had been settled into Steven's old bedroom, Steven and Peggy had a long talk with him to explain the rules of the house and the expectations they had for him.

"One of the conditions of staying here is that you have to get a job and keep it, in addition to your at-home studies," Peggy said. "Now, that might mean finding something in the village, or you could accept responsibilities here instead. It's a large house, and there are plenty of things to be done to care for it."

"So you want me to be your Cinderella," Clint quipped with an attempt at a smile, although his humor seemed a little forced. Somewhat to the family's surprise, he had seemed more embarrassed than angry by the decision to move him to Winchester. "Scrub the floors, wash the windows, muck out the stables."

"No stables, but the rest of that would be extremely helpful," Peggy said seriously. "Your aunt and uncle work long hours, and unfortunately your grandfather and I are slowing down a bit, as much as we hate to admit it. Joe and Amanda both have their chores, of course, and they help as much as they can, but they have a lot of homework to do."

"Yeah, and Amanda has her swimming, and Joe has his newspaper," Clint said, one of those odd notes of bitterness creeping into his voice.

"You don't have to do the cleaning," Steve put in. "I've been doing the cooking, but you could take that over if you'd rather."

Clint's eyes flicked down to the floor. "I don't know how to cook."

"Neither did I, at your age," Steve admitted. "In fact, I didn't learn until I was married. But everyone really appreciates having a hot meal waiting for them at the end of the day. Might be a little more glory in that than mopping floors."

Clint thought that over for a long moment. "Would you stay with me while I do it?" he asked Steve a little tentatively. "Tell me what to do and how to do it?"

"Sure. I'd like that."

Clint half-shrugged. "Okay. I'll try that, I guess."

For the next few weeks, he did his school lessons with Peggy in the mornings and then learned meal planning, grocery shopping and cooking from Steve, and both of them were heartened by the fact that he seemed to be putting some effort into it all. Of course, in the kitchen his learning curve was so steep that he needed continual guidance and it wasn't saving Steve any time or work yet, but Steve frankly enjoyed the time they time they spent together. Every once in a while something bitter or self-critical would slip out of Clint's mouth, but mostly he was energetic and funny, and when he was around there was never a dull moment.

Joe and Amanda got into the habit of playing card games with him in the evenings if they got their homework done in time, which usually turned into riotous laughter that went on past their bedtimes. It wasn't exactly ideal for the adults in the house who were trying to sleep, but they were all so glad that Clint had found a healthy way to have a good time that they let it go on.

One day Maggie came over to join the cooking lesson, having been asked to host a dinner for a crowd of her in-laws' political colleagues and realizing that there were several traditional English dishes Henry's mother was asking for that she didn't feel confident making just yet. Steve had learned how to make all the classics for Peggy back when they were newlyweds, and so the three of them began cooking up a storm and before long the kitchen was a glorious mess of dirty dishes while the air was filled with the smell of roast beef.

Maggie was in high spirits as they worked; a few weeks ago she and Henry had announced to the whole family that there was a baby on the way, and although there was only the faintest hint of roundness to her belly, she was already full of plans for the nursery and seemed to have all her pregnancy books memorized.

Tien and Peggy were sitting in the dining room working on Peggy's memoirs as the three of them cooked, and far from minding the distractions coming from the kitchen, they were both dipping into the conversation on a regular basis, excited both about the baby and about Maggie's picture appearing in The Sun when they had run a full-page spread of the festivities at Royal Ascot Raceday in their society section.

Steve shared their excitement about the baby, even if he was indifferent about the fashion spread; it had been much too long since there had been a baby in the family, and both he and Peggy were looking forward to finding out if being great-grandparents was as nice as becoming grandparents had been.

Clint had started off the day in high spirits too, but about the time they started moving the loaded dishes to the table, Steve realized that he had stopped participating in the conversation, and his face was uncharacteristically serious as he carelessly jammed a serving spoon into each dish.

When Maggie went back into the kitchen, Steve touched Clint's shoulder. "You okay?" he asked quietly.

Clint didn't look up from what he was doing. "Yeah."

Steve lifted his eyebrows slightly. "Clint. Really. Are you okay?"

Clint shrugged Steve's hand off his shoulder with an impatient gesture. "Why wouldn't I be?" he asked, and then he went back into the kitchen and busied himself filling a pitcher with water.

He remained strangely quiet throughout the dinner, and despite Steve's best efforts he could not find out what was going on by the time they all went to bed that night.

* * *

The next morning Steve woke up early and Tien sent both him and Sammy to San Francisco via portal for a long-planned trip to visit the Pyms.

Pym Industries had taken off over the last decade and Hank was now sitting on a fairly sizable fortune, while Hope had graduated from high school and was now studying business management. Their relationship wasn't exactly at its best. Hank had made good on his determination to send her to boarding school to free himself up to research the Quantum Realm even as he ran a growing company and mentored Darren Cross, and Hope was not the type of person to quietly swallow the indignity of being shoved to the side by her own father. She'd thrown herself heart and soul into her martial arts studies as a way of venting her anger over the situation, and when Sammy showed up Hope immediately started reminiscing about their sparring sessions together back in Bethesda when they were little girls, that summer her mother had died. Before long Hope ended up challenging Sammy to a friendly rematch, and while Hank and Steve talked in the living room, they could hear the girls' grunts and thumps coming from the workout room, punctuated by frequent laughter.

As they'd agreed beforehand, both Steve and Sammy poured their separate efforts into trying to soften Hank and Hope toward one another. It was the reason Peggy had decided not to come; while Hank did not blame her personally for what had happened, she was still a living reminder of his former employment at S.H.I.E.L.D., where everything had gone wrong for him. Her husband "Grant," on the other hand, as a mere friend, was safe.

He did what he could, knowing that he couldn't solve Hank and Hope's problems once and for all during this visit. Hope was destined to sit on the board of Pym Industries and shut her father out of his own company. But Steve cared for them both and wanted to see them happy again. He would have wanted that even if their reconciliation was not crucial for Hank's future discoveries about the Quantum Realm and his invention of the Quantum Tunnel. If he could plant any ideas in Hank's mind that would ease that transition someday, it would be worth it.

When the visit ended, they called Tien to discreetly portal them back home: Sammy back to her dorm at MIT and Steve to Winchester. But the moment he stepped into the cottage, he could hear someone crying. Frowning, Steve followed the sound into the living room.

There, he saw Maggie sitting on the couch, face buried in her hands while her shoulders shook with short, bitter sobs. Sarah was sitting next to her, while Maggie's husband Henry sat on her other side with one arm wrapped around her shoulders, looking pale and serious.

Peggy was perched in a chair pulled up close to them, one hand resting on Maggie's knee, but when she saw Steve standing in the doorway she quickly stood up and pulled him into the hallway for a whispered conversation.

"Please don't tell me-" Steve began, a quiet dread filling his heart, as there was only one thing he could think of that could make Maggie cry like that.

"She's losing the baby," Peggy confirmed in an undertone.

Steve was quiet for a long moment as her words sunk in. "Isn't there anything we can do for her?" he asked tentatively. "At the clinic?" They'd never tried such a thing with the serum, but if there was any chance, any chance at all…

Peggy shook her head slowly. "It's too late. There's no heartbeat. It's just a matter of time now."

Steve blinked several times, trying to understand. "But… that never happened to us, or to Sarah or Mike. I thought maybe the genetic changes-"

"It happens," Peggy said quietly. "Quite often. Perhaps we just got lucky before now. Or maybe the serum only improved our family's odds. Not eliminated the possibility."

Steve sighed heavily, feeling his heart constrict painfully. For this to happen to anyone was cruel. But for it to happen to Maggie of all people, when being a mother was what she had most longed for her whole life…

"Steve, Clint left the house earlier today and never showed up to handle dinner like he said he would," Peggy continued softly, and Steve's attention snapped back to the present. "He isn't answering his phone, either. I was just about to go out looking when Maggie and Henry showed up."

Steve allowed himself a moment to feel the crushing disappointment. So he'd done it again. Well, it probably would have been too much to ask that he and Peggy could solve Clint's problems when Mike and Tien hadn't been able to.

"I can go," Steve said after a beat.

"I can do it if you need," Peggy said quickly. "You've already been out today. You must be tired."

"I'm fine," he said firmly. "You should stay. Maggie would probably rather have a woman's touch right now."

"If you're sure."

He walked into the living room, where Maggie was resting her head on Henry's shoulder, red-eyed and silent, having finally run out of tears to cry. Steve put one hand on top of her head, feeling her dark curls like silk against his fingertips — so much like Peggy's — and then he leaned down to kiss the top of her head.

"I'm so sorry," he told her gently.

* * *

Steve followed Mike's example, and looked in all the usual places. But Clint wasn't in any of Winchester's four tattoo parlors, and no one there remembered seeing him. With a sinking heart, Steve realized that in the hours Clint had been gone, he could easily have gotten on a bus and gone some distance, in any direction, and at this point it might be next to impossible to find him. But bad odds had never stopped him before, and even though it was growing late and his body was beginning to strenuously object to the number of steps he had walked today, he started methodically driving from pub to pub to continue the search.

He finally got lucky at the third place as he went from table to table showing Clint's photo, and a man said easily that he remembered seeing him.

"Yeah, he was here," the man said, handing back the photo. "But he left with Amy. 'Bout an hour ago, I think."

Steve's heart leaped with hope. "Do you know where Amy lives?" he asked, trying to keep his voice steady.

The man laughed. "There isn't a man in this pub who doesn't know where _she_ lives."

Steve was worried he wouldn't give up the address, but he did, remarking dryly that if it was _his_ kid, he wouldn't want him hanging out with that woman, either. Steve drove straight there, hoping and praying with all his strength that Clint would still be there, and despite muscles grown uncomfortably stiff he tried to hurry up the dingy, unlit stairs to the flat in question.

A young woman answered the door, and when he asked if she was Amy, she shot him a suspicious look, still holding the door open only a crack.

"Depends on who's asking," she said.

"I need to see Clint," he said.

"Who?"

"My grandson."

"Never heard of him."

Steve squared up his shoulders, leveled his gaze at her and said nothing. She stared back at him in a challenging kind of way, but he didn't so much as blink, and after a long wait she seemed to melt under his gaze, taking a slow step backward and letting go of the door so that it swung open the rest of the way.

Clint was sitting in the hallway behind her, leaning back against the wall, with his hands resting palms up on the threadbare carpet, staring at nothing in particular. Steve gently but firmly pushed his way past the young woman, and Clint looked up at him, eyes noticeably glassy even in the dim light.

"Oh. You," he said.

It hurt, but Steve got himself down on one knee to face Clint directly.

"You didn't tell anyone where you were going," he told Clint. "You had us all worried."

"Why? I'm good here."

Steve's eyes drifted down. There was a syringe on the carpet next to Clint, and a little glass bottle. Steve picked up the vial, and a surge of fear shot through him when he read the label and then realized it was empty. His heart suddenly racing, Steve looked over at Clint and quickly reached out to check his pulse.

"M' okay," Clint said, clumsily pulling his arm away. "Just... makes me sleepy."

"Sleepy? Clint, this is what doctors give to people going in for _surgery_," Steve said, feeling sick.

"'S the only thing that works on me." His words were slurred together, his eyelids drooping. "Just gotta… turn everything off. You know?"

"_Why_?" Steve asked, bewildered and worried and most of all, scared to death because he kept hearing Bruce Banner's words from long around echoing inside his head:_ I got low. I didn't see an end. So I put a bullet in my mouth. _Was that where Clint's mind was? Was he intentionally trying to hurt himself? "Why are you doing this?"

"Gotta sleep," he mumbled, closing his eyes and tipping his head back against the wall.

"Leave him alone," a voice said, and Steve looked over to see Amy glaring at him from a few feet away.

"He came here to get away from his family," she said. "That's what he said. So just go away. He doesn't want you."

"I'm not leaving him alone. He's my grandson, and he's coming home with me," Steve said firmly.

The girl looked visibly annoyed, but after a few seconds she shrugged her shoulders and wandered away.

Steve looked back down at Clint, who had slumped back against the wall and looked for all the world as if he never intended to move again.

"Grandson? What grandson? 'M not even related to you," Clint mumbled.

"Considering you just took something that should have knocked out a horse and lived to tell the tale, I'm pretty sure that isn't true," Steve said.

He tried to get Clint up, but it quickly became clear he'd need a little more time before he went anywhere. And so painfully, stiffly, Steve managed to lower himself down on the floor and leaned up against the wall next to Clint.

Clint took in a slow wheezy breath and looked at him bleary-eyed.

"You hate me," he said.

"No, I don't," Steve said firmly. "I love you."

"No. You hate me."

"I love you."

"Lying," Clint mumbled.

"I don't ever."

Clint's eyes seemed to grow moist, but then he grimaced and pressed his palms into his eyes and didn't move or speak anymore. They sat there side by side in the hallway for a long time in silence.

Eventually, Amy came back, arms folded across her chest.

"Are you going to shove off, or what?" she asked Steve.

"We'll both leave as soon as he's ready," he said calmly.

"No, you'll leave when _I_ say, you decrepit old gaffer," she shot back. "This is my flat, and I didn't invite you!"

"Shut up," Clint said unexpectedly, lifting his head up with eyes suddenly darkening. He stared a challenge at her. "You don't know who you're talking to."

"Clint-" Steve said quickly, worried that he might say too much in his impaired state.

"You're talking to my grandpa," Clint said forcefully. "So _you_ shove off."

"Oh, that's great," she said sharply. "That's just great. Do you know how much that cost, what I just gave you? I wasn't about to make you pay, not for the first one, but _now_-"

She broke off as Clint made a clumsy attempt to get up. It was a bit of a struggle, but eventually he managed to get back onto his two feet. Suddenly worried that the situation might get out of hand, Steve started to get up, too, but his muscles had gone cold and he wasn't much more graceful than Clint had been.

Seeing it, Clint braced one hand against the wall and offered the other to Steve. Both of them were wobbly, but they managed to steady each other enough until Steve got back on his feet, too. Then Clint looked at the girl with narrowed eyes for a long moment until he reached into his pocket, dug out his wallet, and dropped several bills, letting them flutter disdainfully down to the floor. Then he turned his back on her.

Somehow they managed to help each other out to the car, and Steve drove them both home.

* * *

Maggie and Henry had gone home by the time they arrived. Sarah checked Clint over and then gave him an injection to counteract the effects of what he'd taken, suggesting that someone watch over him tonight just to be safe. So Peggy took the first shift sitting in a chair by Clint's bedside, and in the early hours of the morning Steve took over for her. To his relief, Clint kept breathing slowly and steadily until he finally woke up about an hour after Joe and Amanda had left for school.

Clint sat up slowly, looking around the room a little confused for a few seconds before he saw Steve sitting there. Then he seemed to remember all at once, and an expression of self-loathing crossed his face.

"How are you feeling?" Steve asked.

Clint ran one hand through his mussed hair, and then let his hand fall limply to the mattress. "Like crap," he said flatly.

"Are you hungry? I can make you something."

"It's my job to cook." Clint stared down at the rumpled blankets, the corners of his mouth curving downward. "I was supposed to cook last night. I screwed everything up, didn't I? _Again_."

"Everybody does sometimes," Steve said quietly.

Clint laughed humorlessly. "No one screws up like me."

"You weren't yourself," Steve said patiently. "I could tell something was going on the night before that. Why didn't you talk to me about it? I'm here to help you. Remember?"

Clint shoved the blankets off his legs and planted his bare feet on the carpet. "How could I?" he asked with a sudden passion. "You wouldn't understand. You, least of all!"

"Well, you might at least give me a chance to try," Steve said mildly.

Clint stood up and paced away from him, staring blindly out the window even though the sun was shining too weakly through the overcast sky to illuminate much of the garden below.

"So what was it?" Steve asked gently from behind him. "What set you off?"

Clint sighed heavily. "You'll hate me."

"I think we've already established that I won't."

There was a long silence. Then he turned to face Steve and spoke a single word: "Maggie."

"What did she say to you?" Steve asked.

"It isn't what she said," Clint said with a faint scowl. "It's what she _is_."

Steve's brow creased. "And that is?"

"The same thing everyone else in this family is. _Perfect_."

Steve absorbed that for a long moment. "Do you really think that about us?"

"Hmmm, well, let's see," Clint said with mock thoughtfulness. "When my grandma retired, she was named an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire by the Queen of England. My grandpa saved the world so many times he's lost count now. My dad's a world-class spy even if the world doesn't know it, and my mom can travel across the planet in the blink of an eye-"

"Clint-" Steve started.

"No, wait. Just wait. I haven't even mentioned my siblings," Clint barged on. "My big brother is a bodyguard for the future savior of the galaxy. One of my sisters is a top-notch ballerina and the other one knew how to hack the internet before it even existed. Oh yeah, and I have a cousin who gets plastered all over the newspapers every time she goes to the races in her fancy hats and dresses to mingle with the upper crust. I wouldn't be surprised if her baby ends up having playdates with the royals. Not to mention the cousin that's a doctor, and the one that's a Marine, and the one that-"

"Clint, this family is not a competition," Steve interrupted firmly. "No one expects-"

"It isn't about _expectations_," Clint said, his voice raw. "Grandpa, I don't even _care_ that everyone in the family is doing better than me. I can live with that. It's that I don't even know what _I_ want to do. _That's_ the part I can't stand. Everyone else is good at something, or at least knows what they want to be good at. I've got nothing. _Nothing_. I don't want to go anywhere or do anything. I just-" He flung his arms up in a gesture of defeat. "I just want everybody to leave me alone."

"Do you really want me to leave you alone?"

"No," Clint mumbled after a long pause. "Not you. And Steven. I don't mind him. You know, I really should hate him. He has everything I don't. He has that insane Rogers drive. Musta skipped over me somehow. But he's too nice to hate. He looks at me, and I think he gets it. He gets me. I don't make him uncomfortable like I do everyone else. Wish he wasn't always on duty, training somewhere."

Steve mulled that over for a minute. "What does Steven get about you that the rest of us don't?" he asked at last.

Clint's next words were almost a whisper. "He knows what it's like to not fit in anywhere."

Steve fought to suppress the surge of grief that shot through him. He'd been there — had spent half his life there — but he hadn't had a lonely day in his life since he had created a family for himself. He thought his children and grandchildren would be spared from that kind of isolation, that having parents and siblings and cousins who were all in the same boat would give them a place to belong. And it _had_ worked, for the rest of them. How had they failed Clint so badly? And Steven too, apparently. He fought his impulse to deny the problem, to defend his own choices that had led to this pass, and instead asked Clint quietly: "What makes you think you don't fit in?"

"_Look_ at me, Grandpa!" Clint gestured to himself vehemently. "I'm Vietnamese... only I'm not. But I'm not American anymore, either. I'm a supersoldier — kinda — except I'm not really that either. And everyone in this family _loves_ being what they are, loves having their little secret from the world, loves being little mini-Avengers or Prevengers or whatever Harrison's calling it now, but I'm no good for anything like that, and I don't even _want_ to be!"

"What _do_ you want?"

Clint's face was reddened, his chest rising and falling with barely-suppressed emotion. "I don't _know_!"

Steve was silent for a minute, letting him calm down a little before asking seriously: "Well, what makes you happy?"

Clint laughed humorlessly, and didn't answer.

"No, really," Steve pressed. "What makes you happy?"

Bitterness flashed in his eyes. "You won't like it."

"Try me."

The silence stretched out for several minutes, but Steve just sat back, waiting, until finally Clint said quietly: "The tattoo parlor, I guess."

"Why?"

"I don't know."

"Yes, you do."

Clint's face worked for a minute, and then he said, almost reluctantly: "I know some people think it's just scribbles on skin, but it really is art. It's pretty cool, actually. And it means something special to the person getting it. Something really individual, something that's just for them."

Steve nodded, keeping his face neutral. "What else do you like about it?"

"No one there _judges_," Clint blurted out and suddenly more words came tumbling out of him as though he'd only been waiting for an invitation to say them. "You know what I mean? Everyone has problems, and you can talk about them there and no one looks at you funny. Or you can listen to someone else talk, and maybe think of something you can say to help them, or at least make them smile for a while. Grandpa, do you- Do you believe me? I know everybody thinks I'm just doing this stuff to get attention. I swear that isn't it. But please… please tell me you understand." His brown eyes were pleading.

Steve took a deep breath and chose his words carefully. "I'm not gonna pretend to understand it, Clint, but it isn't about me. You've only got one life to live, and you need to find a way to be happy without destroying yourself in the process. That stuff that happened last night? That can't happen again. I know you know that. So you tell me: How can you take the interests and the talents that you have and turn them into something that's healthy for you, and maybe even does some good for the world around you too?"

Clint looked frustrated. "I'm not like you, Grandpa. Everything you touch turns to gold. I swear, if I couldn't do some of the things I can do, I wouldn't think we were even related."

Steve smiled with wry amusement. "First of all, you just got through telling me how much you love talking to people and listening to their problems and helping them feel better. And you still think you're not like me?"

Clint snorted a little. "Let's face it, Grandpa, a tattoo parlor's a little grittier than your old counselor's office, don't you think?"

"And second of all," Steve continued, "not everything I touch turns into gold. I've made mistakes in my life. A few of them were pretty bad. That thing that's going to happen in 30 years? The one that's going to tear our family in half, along with every other family in the galaxy? That was on _me_. You think I don't know what failure tastes like? That I never had mornings after that when I wondered why I even bothered to get up, when there just didn't seem to be a point to it anymore?"

"You did?" Clint said slowly.

"You're thinking of Captain America like he was some kind of living legend, like he was never unsure of himself, like he couldn't do wrong," Steve said. "Well, I was there, and I'm telling you, it wasn't like that."

Clint was looking at him as if with new eyes. "But how did you get out of that hole, Grandpa? That's the part I can't figure out."

Steve shook his head a little. "I wish there was an easy answer. Back then, I hit on the idea of leading therapy sessions, partly because I thought maybe I could relieve the guilt a little by trying to help people through the situation I'd caused in the first place. Partly it was because that was something Sam Wilson had done, and... maybe I was trying to replace him, trying to keep him alive by keeping his work going. I'm not sure any of that was really a good reason to do what I did. But at least I had a reason to get out of bed in the morning, and I think I did manage to help some people-" He let out a quick sigh. "-even if I couldn't help myself. To tell you the truth, I wasn't really right again until Scott Lang showed up on my doorstep and gave me a shred of hope."

Clint's shoulders sagged. "So you're telling me I just have to grit my teeth and power through this crap?"

"I'm not telling you anything. All I can tell you is what I did. You're gonna have to figure out a solution for yourself."

"That sucks, Grandpa. That really, really sucks."

"Well, you're smart. You'll come up with something. But you've got to make up your mind to do it, and stick to it even when things don't instantly get better. We all love you, and we'll be here to help you up every time you fall, but we can't do this for you. You're stronger than you know, and you _can_ do this for yourself. I know you will."

Clint was uncharacteristically quiet all day, and that night as he and Steve worked together to clean up after dinner, he suddenly asked: "Does it really help to help other people?"

"I think it does," Steve said. "Gets you out of your own head."

"Well... who am I supposed to help?" Clint asked with faint bewilderment. "You guys don't want me going places where people are using. I'll relapse again. But that's where I'm always meeting people who need the most help."

"You could start with your own family," Steve suggested.

"You must be joking," Clint said with a snort. "_Our_ family? Everyone here already has everything together." Then his face fell; he'd been both shocked and touchingly worried when they'd told him earlier that day about Maggie losing the baby. "Well... except Maggie. And... Steven too, I guess."

"You said this morning that he felt lost, too."

Clint's eyes suddenly widened. "I shouldn't have-" he started, looking stricken. "That was private, I wasn't supposed to talk about-"

"It's between you and him," Steve said quickly. "I won't put my nose in your business or his. But if you're looking for someone to help... Well, I've been worried about him, too."

Clint was quiet for a long moment. "But what am I supposed to _do _for them?"

"What you always do. What you're good at. Start by listening. People are good at putting on faces. You have to really listen before they start trusting you enough to tell the truth about what's going on underneath. Once you know that, you'll start seeing ways to help."

* * *

Winter changed into spring, and by the time the lilac bushes in Peggy's garden started to bloom, Clint had been able to scrape together enough self-discipline to complete his GED. He didn't seem to be in a rush to move out, though, and both his parents and Steve and Peggy weren't inclined to push it, either. Clint now knew how to make a number of meals without any help from Steve. He even seemed to like doing it, although any suggestions that he might turn his burgeoning cooking skills into a profession were immediately rebuffed. It was clear he wasn't ready for something like that.

And so he stayed on into the summer, and poured his full concentration into whipping up the hors d'oeuvres for Bram and Aliyah's wedding reception, held in the cottage's garden at its prime. To the whole family's great amusement, several of the Masters of the Mystic Arts that Aliyah had befriended during her short stay at Kamar-Taj, before leaving to join Sarah and Dave's magical medical staff, showed up in their traditional garb to join the celebration. Henry's parents, as both their next door neighbors and Maggie's in-laws, had naturally been invited, and the skeptical looks they leveled at those neatly pleated tunics and flowing robes were priceless. Clint imitated their expressions to a T as Steven snapped a photo of him, and even Maggie had to admit later that it was the funniest photo in Bram and Aliyah's wedding album.

With his doctorate completed, Bram and Aliyah moved to Salt Lake City as soon as their honeymoon was over to run a new satellite clinic Dave and Sarah had just opened up there. They had decided to spread their clinics across the globe widely, and not only in major cities, to give the gift of healing as equitably as possible. It helped that so many of their employees were former trainees from Kamar-Taj, which also drew in students from around the globe, and who therefore already knew a variety of languages. They now had clinics in every inhabited continent, some of them small but all of them growing.

Another year came and went, and Amanda left home to attend university in Dublin. Clint, however, made no plans to leave Winchester. He had months at a time when he did well, when Steve and Peggy could hardly imagine life without him — the way he broke them out of their ruts and kept them both smiling, the way he could nonchalantly run errands and handle tasks around the house that the two of them were beginning to struggle to take care of themselves, the way he kept in constant touch with Steven and managed to coax more information out of his introverted cousin than anyone else could about how he was really doing, as the stress of military life sometimes brought him down.

But Clint had more relapses, too. There were days when Steve and Peggy searched the town high and low for him, knowing what state they'd find him in when they located him or he decided to finally come back home. There were a lot of sleepless nights and long, emotionally fraught conversations. There were weeks at a time when Mike and Tien decided to stay at the cottage, too, to better show their son their love without disrupting his life by bringing him back to Quy Nhon with them. It meant the household was frequently in a state of turmoil, with people coming and going and uncomfortable conversations happening at odd hours of the night. Joe, as the last of Sarah and Dave's children left at home, sometimes could not hide his frustration with the disturbances as he tried to finish his last year of high school, and his parents ended up taking him for long drives when it got to be too much for him, hoping to give him the individual attention he needed, too.

When spring rolled back around, Joe moved out of the cottage to start his education at Boston University, studying to be a journalist. At the same time, Amanda moved back in and joined St. Raphael's staff, but not as a healer like her older brother Bram. She had completed her degree in business management in record time by attending classes year-round, and to Dave and Sarah's great relief she took over many of their administrative duties, leaving Dave more time to work out new lines of serum research and freeing Sarah to handle the training of new healers and perform the trickier procedures that patients needed.

Amanda was clearly in her element, keeping the wheels of the business greased, and Clint joked to her face that it must be good for her to have her lifelong dream of bossing people around fulfilled so soon, which Amanda readily agreed to without a trace of shame.

As Clint's third year living in Winchester came to an end, he had the longest stretch yet without any relapses. Steve could see the hope growing in him, that maybe this time he would be able to keep it up. Maybe he could finally begin living the life he wanted. Because Clint had finally settled on a goal for himself. After a lot of thinking and talking and planning with both Peggy and Steve and his own parents, he finally took the plunge and moved out to begin an apprenticeship to a tattoo artist in Chicago.

It wasn't exactly the kind of future they had once envisioned for their son, as Mike and Tien both admitted, but the fact that Clint had chosen a direction at all, and was putting in the effort to make it a reality, was such a relief to them that they were genuinely glad for him. As long as he could stay sober while he was doing it, it was all they could ask. They kept in touch with him as often as possible, facilitated by Tien's sling ring, and made sure he knew he was loved and accepted.

It seemed that his cousin Steven also spoke with him often, in person when they could, but mostly on the phone because of Steven's demanding duties with the Marines. Steven was always careful not to betray any confidences, but whenever he quietly reassured Mike and Tien that Clint was still doing well, they relaxed; they knew Steven could be trusted not to lie.

* * *

**June 30, 2001**

With the grandchildren spreading so widely across the globe as they left home, the family realized they needed to plan ahead if they wanted to gather everyone together all at once, especially since Bram, Maggie and Natty, as the married ones, now needed to split their holidays between their parents and their in-laws. And so Steve and Peggy chose a day for everyone to meet at Ocean Village in Southampton, intending for it to become an annual summertime event.

From his vantage point under an enormous beach umbrella shading him and Peggy in their lounge chairs, Steve could see his whole family enjoying the sun as seagulls cried overhead and the cool ocean breeze fluttered the edges of their towels spread out on the sand.

Natty was standing back to back with Bram's wife Aliyah, both of them showing off their baby bumps and ear-to-ear smiles as their husbands snapped away with their cameras. Meanwhile, beside him, Peggy was carefully lifting the new baby out of Maggie's arms. Maggie's expression was a mixture of pride and anxiousness as she handed the baby over. She didn't really like letting him out of her arms, Steve had noticed, much less her sight. It was as if she was afraid the baby would vanish as suddenly as the one she had lost, although this pregnancy had thankfully developed normally, with an uneventful delivery.

"Oh, you are a sweet one, aren't you?" Peggy crooned softly as she cuddled the baby up to her chest. "Yes, you are. You are just perfect." Steve felt a smile tugging at his lips, remembering the countless times he had seen Peggy cradling their own children in the same way.

"Maybe I missed a memo, but I didn't catch _which_ James this little man here was named after," Sammy said, kneeling on the sand by Peggy and reaching over to gently smooth down the baby's tufts of dark hair.

"He's named after all three of them," Henry said promptly from Maggie's side. "My father, and Bucky, and Rhodey. We'll call him Jim to set him apart."

"Hey Harrison, why isn't Christina here? When are you gonna put a ring on it?" Bram demanded, lowering his camera as Harrison walked past, moving his feet quickly in the hot sand.

"Buzz off," Harrison said, although a smile lit up his face as he paused under the shade of the umbrella to answer. "I'll do it when I'm good and ready."

"Well, hurry it up," Aliyah broke in, one hand resting on her burgeoning belly as drops of salt water glittered on her long box braids. "You have a weird family, and I need a fellow sister-in-law to commiserate with."

"Oh, that's cute. The sorceress is calling _us_ weird," Harrison said.

"I spent all of _three months_ at Kamar-Taj," Aliyah defended herself. She had never been one to take an insult lying down. "At this point your aunt has taught me more spells than they ever did."

"Just think how convenient it would be to have not one but _two_ Carters keeping a close eye on Tony Stark," Bram told Harrison, slipping his arm around Aliyah's waist.

"That is _not_ why I'm dating-" Harrison began vehemently.

"-a fellow Stark Industries employee. We know, we know," Bram said with a wink.

"If you want to bug someone about girls, bug your own brother," Harrison shot back, gesturing at Steven, who had just emerged from the surf dripping with water after a solo swim far out to sea. "As far as I can tell, he isn't even dating."

"Have you guys seen the divorce statistics for active duty Marines?" Steven said mildly as he vigorously dried his back off with a towel. "I'm doing my future family a favor. One thing at a time."

"Sounds like a really lousy, lonely way to live if you ask me," Harrison said. "When are you gonna quit the Marines and live like a normal person?"

"When I'm done."

"When's that?" Bram pressed. "Just what exactly are you aiming for here? Uncle Mike says you can already out-fight almost anyone in the world. What is there left for you to learn?"

Steven didn't answer for a long moment, face impassive as beads of seawater slid down his muscled chest. At that moment, Clint came to his rescue; the rest of them hadn't even noticed him arriving behind his mother and father, wearing flip-flops under his Bermuda shorts. He had a design etched across his left pectoral, although it wasn't a tattoo — he had given up on getting one of those for himself — but only henna. He often joked that it was the perfect way to test out designs for customers anyway, although it was challenging to do it backwards, facing a mirror.

"I'm pretty sure Steven's the only person here qualified to decide what's best for Steven," Clint said mildly, and Harrison and Bram both dropped the subject, looking a little guilty.

"Race you to the water," Harrison said to Bram then, and in moments both of them were charging full-speed into the surf.

A visibly relieved Steven strode over to give Clint a brief hug. "Hey, Clint. How's Chi-Town?" he asked.

"Windy," Clint said promptly. "How's Twentynine Palms?"

"Hot."

They grinned at each other, and then wandered off down the beach together to get caught up on each other's news. They had only just gone out of earshot when Dave, Sarah and Joe came back from the concessions hut with their arms full of bottled drinks, and immediately found themselves swarmed by thirsty people.

"How's Boston?" Tien asked Joe as she accepted the last water bottle from him. "Are they keeping you busy?"

"Between my classes and the student paper?" Joe ran his fingers through his wet hair, making it stand out in three different directions. "I barely have time to breathe."

"I bet you love being free of all that red tape your high school principal tried to tie you up with when you were trying to print that paper of yours back in Winchester," Dave said.

"You would think," Joe said with a hint of disgust.

"Don't tell me your university administration tries to control what you print?" Amanda said in surprise. "In college? In _America_?"

"Not the administration," Joe said grimly. "The professors."

"_What_?" Amanda said, even more startled. "You don't mean your journalism professors?"

"Some of 'em. And other departments. I don't mean to make it sound worse than it is," Joe added quickly. "It's not like anyone's playing dirty tricks or doing anything illegal. But the pressure... the pressure on our staff to favor certain narratives in the stories we cover is unrelenting. And when it's authority figures pressuring kids who have only been reporting for a year or two and aren't confident yet in what they're doing, well, you can imagine the situation."

"And there you are, trying to cover both sides fairly," Sarah said sympathetically.

"_No_," Joe said vehemently. "That's half the problem. I'm trying to cover all _three or four_ sides fairly. There are usually at least that many, no matter what the issue is. But everyone seems to be locked into this X versus Y viewpoint. Everyone wants a villain to point at. No one wants nuance. I thought... I thought it would be better in college." He looked frustrated. "I can't wait to graduate. Get out into the real world, get a job at a real paper. Where they know how to do it right."

Just then, Bram and Harrison jogged back up from their dip in the water and snagged themselves a couple of drinks before sinking down into the sand to bolt them down.

"How about you, Sammy?" Aliyah asked, nudging her where she lay stretched out on her towel in her swimsuit, eyes closed against the brightness of the sun. "You anxious to graduate and get away from MIT?"

"Are you kidding me?" Sammy said, propping herself up on one elbow and shading her eyes so she could look at them. "MIT's the best thing that ever happened to me. I've never seen so many brilliant minds packed into one little space. I'm not sure I want to leave at all." She shrugged a little. "I guess maybe I'll have to. Get some experience at one of those up-and-coming tech companies. But I might go back someday."

"To teach?"

"Maybe."

"You could probably teach them a thing or two now," Harrison said slyly.

"They don't let instructors teach students how to do anything that's technically illegal," Sammy pointed out dryly.

"Technically!" Harrison howled, slapping his sister on the back. "_Technically_!"

"Look, _someone_ has to hack into databases and scrub our family's photos and records out of them," Sammy said calmly, settling back down onto her towel. "_Someone_ has to keep things clean until Arnim Zola's creepy computer brain gets blown up, and Ultron's done doing what he's going to do. Can't have either of them figuring out there are two Steve Rogers, after all, not to mention a dozen or so descendants."

From the towel beside her, Amanda sighed deeply, arranging herself more comfortably on the sand, her eyes hidden behind a pair of sunglasses. "I _love_ the beach," she said with feeling. "I think I need to live on one."

"Seriously?" Sammy asked.

"I've been thinking about moving to California," Amanda confessed. "St. Raphael's is international now, and there's really no reason why I should have to work in gray and gloomy old England. Especially when we have portals."

"Our mothers already spend half their lives portaling people back and forth where they need to go," Sammy pointed out.

"Maybe I should get my own sling ring," Amanda said thoughtfully. "There really should be more of us who can, don't you think?"

"Probably."

"Hey Mom," Mike said lazily from where he was laying on his towel, "how long are we staying here?"

"As long as we want," Peggy said, tipping her head back with a beatific expression on her face as the cool breeze rippled over them again. Baby James had fallen asleep on her chest, with his lips pursed and one tiny fist pressed up against his round cheek. "Sharon and her family won't be here until morning, and I already have her sweet sixteen gift wrapped and ready to go."

"What is it?" Joe asked curiously.

"Thigh holster," Peggy said promptly.

Harrison laughed. "Oh, her mother's going to love that."

"Well, not really, no."

"Grandpa?" Clint asked Steve, crouching down by his lounge chair. He and Steven had just gotten back from his walk. "You up to walking with me a ways?"

"Yeah," Steve agreed. Clint gave him a hand up, and soon they were strolling down the beach, leaving the deeper, hotter sand to walk through the shallow waves lapping against the shore instead.

"So how are you doing?" Steve asked Clint as he stooped to pick up a seashell and throw it far out into the waves.

"I've been sober for 14 months and three weeks," Clint said with the cadence of someone who had uttered similar sentences many times before.

Steve patted his back briefly. "Good. Work going well?"

"Yeah. My trainer likes my designs. Says my technique is getting better. Got a raise this month, which was nice."

"Gonna move into a better place?"

Clint laughed. "A better place? What, you don't like the shabby urban studio apartment I have now?" He chucked another seashell into the water. "Nah, I'm saving up for something better. Got my eye on a Harley Davidson Road King Classic I'd like to buy. Might be a little more fun than always taking the L."

"I approve," Steve said immediately.

Clint grinned knowingly. "I knew you would."

"Might help you pick up chicks," Steve added.

"Really? Hadn't thought of that."

They exchanged smiles.

"Making good friends?" Steve asked.

Clint nodded. "Yeah. I've actually got one living with me right now. He came into the parlor for a tat, and was brave enough to let a trainee like me practice on him. He's a good guy. Or at least he's trying to be. He was kinda in a spot of trouble. Girlfriend kicked him out of her place, but he's between jobs and couldn't get a place of his own. There are shelters, of course, but they don't let people in when they're impaired, for safety reasons. He wants to be clean, he really does, but he can't always manage it. So, long story short, he ended up panhandling on the streets."

"And he spent what he got on a _tat_?"

"Not the smartest decision," Clint acknowledged. "And he knew that. Sometimes people don't always do what they know they should. I get that. Anyway, that's why he's sleeping on my couch, and I'm helping him stay clean while he looks for a job." He started to throw another seashell into the waves, but then looked at it more closely and decided to tuck it into the pocket of his shorts instead. "At least I hope I'm helping."

"I'm sure you are," Steve said. "He's lucky he met you."

"I hope so."

"I'm proud of you."

Clint's chin went up slightly, his chest poking out a bit. "That's... kinda nice to hear," he admitted.

**TO BE CONTINUED**

* * *

_**Author's note: **Here's the updated family free. Spouses are in parenthesis._

**Sarah** (Dave), running St. Raphael's Medical Services headquartered in Winchester, England. Their children:

**Bram **(Aliyah), 27, running St. Raphael's clinic in Salt Lake City, Utah

**Maggie** (Henry), 25, living in London and working at a children's nonprofit, raising newborn son, James.

**Steven**, 22, based at Marine Corps Base in Twentyninepalms, California

**Amanda**, 20, living in Winchester, England and working as business administrator for St. Raphael's

**Joe**, 18, journalism student at Boston University

* * *

**Mike** (Tien), living in Qui Nhon, Vietnam, training Clint Barton in Washington, D.C. Their children:

**Natty** (Quyen), 26, ballet dancer, living in Ho Chi Minh City

**Harrison**, 24, living in New York City, working for Stark Industries

**Sammy**, 22, student at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts

**Clint,** 20, living in Chicago, training as tattoo artist

* * *

_Phew. This chapter was a beast to write. I welcome reviews! _


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